


Leather Bracelets and Iron Hearts

by catstrophysics



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Bracelets, Confessions, Dean's a Bisexual Disaster, Fluff, M/M, Minor Pamela Barnes/Dean Winchester, Original Poetry - Freeform, Poet Castiel (Supernatural), Poetry, Rabbit!Lucifer, Smart Dean Winchester, Soulmate-Identifying Marks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-28
Updated: 2019-09-06
Packaged: 2019-10-18 03:02:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 20,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17573045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catstrophysics/pseuds/catstrophysics
Summary: In a world where everyone has a unique bracelet given to them that heats up when their soulmate is near or in contact with them, Dean’s starts to burn one day when a note appears in his bag. With a challenge from the intriguing boy in his English class, a scorned ex-lover, and two missing bracelets, will Dean realize that he's looking in the wrong places, or will notes and a poem lead him to the right place?





	1. Calligraffitied Notes

_Tuesday_

The note lay crinkled on Dean’s desk and he tried his best to ignore it. It stared at him, mocking his cowardice, just on the edge of his vision as the teacher continued to explain conservation of mechanical energy to the less-than-interested physics class. He tried hard not to think about what it said, or what it meant that he’d carried it around for two hours now. Or how the soulmate band around his wrist glowed hot when he looked at the paper. 

_~~~ Earlier ~~~_

Dean was rushing to get to class on time, weaving between the crush of people as he made his way upstairs to the chemistry lab. He slipped through the door and fell into his seat at the back as the bell rang. Gingerly, he slipped his backpack from one shoulder to the ground next to him, wincing as it pulled at the sore muscles in his bicep. He pulled his phone from the pocket of his leather jacket, skimming through notifications as the teacher set up for class. No one had texted except his brother, wondering about dinner that night, and he typed out a hasty reply before shoving the phone away in his backpack and grabbing for his binder and a pencil. With a touch of chagrin, he realized the latter was nowhere to be found. Leaning back casually in his chair he tried for the attention of the girl sitting behind him. 

“Hey, you gotta pencil?” he asked, turning a dazzling smile on her without a second thought. 

She blushed, already digging in her bag for one, and he winked as she handed it over. 

“Thanks, sweetheart,” he said, and sat his chair back down on all fours. The teacher was already going on about something vaguely familiar, sketching ethanol on the board in blue marker. Dean’s attention wandered, and he started flipping through the pages of his binder absentmindedly. A slip of paper fluttered out from in his Chapter Sixteen test and settled itself in his lap. _What the hell?_ he wondered, and pinched it between his fingers to inspect more closely. 

It was a note, that much was obvious. Folded into fourths, and blank on the outside except for his name in neat, slanted writing. _Dean_. He tugged it open, molecular mass of alcohols forgotten as his fingers shook. The message inside was simple. A pair of wings, sketched delicately in pencil, above a calligraphy “Soulmate”. His wrist flashed with white-hot heat, and he gasped. _This is from my_ soulmate, he thought, and pressed his fingertips to the pencilled lines. 

Dean’s bracelet had been hot to the touch ever since. 

_~~~ Now ~~~_

Dean reached out with one hand, the note at the corner of his vision too enticing to ignore. It was his _soulmate_ , after all, and no matter how confusing and weird they were being it would all pay off in the end. He fingered the paper loosely, indecisively, before unfolding it again and staring at the calligraphy etched onto the page. Soulmates never corresponded before their meeting. Not even when they knew they’d crossed paths. _So why’d she do it?_ , he mused. The paper before him offered no answers and the bell rang to signal the end of class. 

Second period droned on just as long, despite being calculus, Dean’s favorite subject. Sam, his younger brother, frequently made fun of him for it. “You can’t be good at everything, Dee,” he’d said, “but pretend you’re only good at cars.” Dean really _was_ good at everything, especially math. His soulmate bracelet cooled down enough he could tug it off and inspect it. 

The bracelet was simple, dark black iron and worn brown leather woven together neatly, pressed-in markings and symbols cutting across the plain surfaces. His soulmate’s, though most likely different materials, bore the same markings. His wonderings were cut off by Anna, a demure redhead with an almost perfect grade in the class. She’d tapped his wrist with her pencil and gestured at the board, where the professor was expounding on something about L’Hopital’s Rule. His bracelet sparked hot when she turned her eyes on him and he flinched slipping it back on. She smiled softly at him, her eyes flicking to his bracelet. He felt a pang of understanding. _Anna?_ he wondered. She was beautiful, he noted, but her handwriting, twisting across a sheet of graph paper before her, was hard and slanted and nothing at all like the gentle letters on the note in his pocket. His heart sank to his toes and he tuned out the rest of class, homework for the night already done, and hummed Led Zeppelin 4 under his breath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Kudos and comments are always appreciated, OR leave me a song to listen to while I work! Always on the hunt for new music. 
> 
> Random fact: the Sun makes up 99.86% of the solar system's mass!


	2. A "Forever" Kinda Feeling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dean's given some new information about his soulmate, and has a (minor) identity crisis. 
> 
> Is it forever? Or was he misled?

“Soulmates.” 

Dean’s head jerked up from the desk like his name had been called. Economics was one of his favorite classes for two reasons: it’s applied math to him, and their teacher was fascinating. Every single lesson he explained from a completely different standpoint than the last. Of course, by the second semester he was rapidly running out of standpoints and they’d been taught production possibility curves by a jack-o’-lantern. Apparently, today was soulmates. 

“Soulmates determine lives like economic backgrounds determine careers. How? Discuss.” Dr. Deveraux tapped his fingers on the podium once, then stepped down and began pacing the length of the room. Dean sank back into thought. _My soulmate determines my life, huh? I mean, I guess, but I’m seventeen. She’s probably not even thinking about me like that right now, that was probably a joke from a friend. Yeah, from Charlie or someone._ He smiled softly, thoroughly convinced. The note was a joke, and he didn’t have to worry about it. He started contributing to the discussion, throwing out “Your soulmate can convince you to do things you wouldn’t otherwise do” and “individual factors can have dramatic effects on a person’s livelihood”. The last hour flew by, and Dr. Deveraux shuffled them all out the door with a chapter’s worth of reading and a short essay recapping class that day. Dean carefully refolded the note, his bracelet flashing with warmth as his fingers brushed over the pencil lines, and left the classroom as quickly as possible. 

Outside by the lockers Dean met up with his closest friends to head to the gym for their respective sports practices. Dean’s lacrosse stick rested next to his locker bay, and he picked it up and twirled it before holding it straight out before him. 

“A duel, milady?” he joked, before prancing at Charlie, who scrambled out of the way, short red hair swishing as she moved to pick up her own stick. 

“For the heart of the maiden whose note rests in your pocket, kind sir?” she poked back, brandishing her black, tight-laced lacrosse stick at his face. Dean froze. 

“How the _hell_ do you know about that?” he whispered, hand clutching for his pocket. Charlie lowered her makeshift sword and stepped closer, eyes softening at his obvious distress. 

“I have my ways. Another girl trying to steal you from me?” Charlie’s eyes twinkled with mischief and something else and her mouth tilted up in a half-smile when he blushed. 

“Char, you’re gay. You wouldn’t take me even if you swung my way,” he reminded her, before pulling back quickly and raising his weapon again. “And now, we joust!” he proclaimed, and charged her. Another set of feet walked up behind him as he tapped Charlie in the stomach with the head of his stick. She groaned audibly, and lowered her stick to rest on one foot. 

“Dean,” a honey-smooth voice whispered in his ear, and he whipped around with a broad grin on his face. His heart dropped when he saw her, as always, and she cocked one eyebrow at his half-hearted smile. 

“Hey, Pamela,” he muttered. She tossed him a careless smirk in response and turned to Charlie. 

“You talk to Mr. Oblivious here about the thing yet?” she asked with a wink, pointing a thumb at Dean. 

“Oh, damn. Not yet. You wanna do it?” Charlie blushed furiously before pulling her phone from her pocket and tapping away at the screen. 

Dean turned to face Pamela as she explained. “We’re soulmates, you know. Everyone knows it,” she stated matter-of-factly, and took another step closer. “You and me, it gives me a _forever_ kinda feeling, you know? I know you feel it too, and you know we’re meant to be.” She punctuated this by grabbing his hand and pressing it against her soulmate band, which was hot enough to catch fire. 

“We. Are. Not. _Soulmates_ ,” he answered through gritted teeth, ripping his hand away and resolutely ignoring the pained look on her face. “Your bracelet lied to you.” Picking up his backpack from where it had dropped to the concrete, he broke out in a dead run for the parking lot. Charlie called something out to try for his attention, but he merely shook his head, cheeks on fire with embarrassment and rage. 

The sleek black 1967 Chevy Impala lounged at the far end of the lot, away from sophomores still learning to park and seniors peeling out from their spaces. Dean slowed to a walk a few yards from her, and slid to a seat against the rear fender. He dug through his bag for his phone. Coach had already told him off for cutting practice four times this season, and next time he’d have to run laps the whole practice. Without really thinking, he shot Charlie a text; _Why didn’t u tell me it was Pamela who wrote that note? u know I wanna know all this, and she’s like my best friend (besides you)... cmon Char._ He shoved his phone back in the pocket, and felt paper brush his hand. Another note. When he unfolded it, however, it was devoid of wings and instead had a short note written: 

_I saw you talking to Pamela. Don’t believe the rumors, you’re not meant to be. Did you feel your wrist burn in English today? Poetry Coffeehouse, this Saturday. You have to write a poem for it._

Dean crushed the paper in one hand. A second later, he thought better of it and folded it more carefully. He clicked his phone on and dialed Pamela’s number resolutely. She picked up before the first ring, and he felt the smooth satisfaction in her voice as she greeted him. 

Dean swallowed hard, then spoke. “If we’re soulmates, we should probably start acting like a couple, yeah? I’ll pick you up Friday after school, we can go do something.” He hung up immediately and let out a heavy sigh. “I should tell Sammy.” 

He didn’t, and he left the notes in his car rather than bring them inside the house when he got there. 

***

Alone in his room, cassette tapes playing in the background, Dean allowed himself to fully contemplate the day’s events. His soulmate— _Pamela_ —had written him two notes in the day, completely contradicting each other. He stretched, groaning, and flopped down heavily in his desk chair. 

He began to monologue, gesturing at nothing in particular to sort his thoughts. “Okay. if it is Pamela, then I’m going to end up with a crazy hot chick who’s head-over-friggin’-heels for me. If it’s not Pamela, I’ll end up with some other girl and live a nice life with her.” Dean let his hands drop into his lap, the issue seemingly resolved. Until a quiet demon snuck into his ear and whispered, _Could be a guy, you know. Remember Henry? Mmmm._

Dean held perfectly still, entertaining the idea. “A male soulmate,” he mumbled, brief flickers of messy, short hair and sharply angled curves tumbling through his mind. Rough, calloused hands against his own. The rumble of a deep voice rather than the bell tones of a girl’s voice. “Not bad. But it’s Pamela anyways,” he concluded. “Don’t know why I’m bothering,” he muttered, ignoring the leather band around his wrist almost going cold with the thought. “And ‘m straight,” he tacked on, words near silent as an afterthought. He collapsed from the desk chair to the floor, laying flat on his back staring at the ceiling fan spinning. His eyes started to close, sweeping him towards the warm oblivion of a dreamless nap. 

Within moments, he sat bolt upright. 

“Saturday.” Four days to go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave kudos if you liked it, they're basically like food but less edible. 
> 
> Comment the last song you listened to that got _really_ stuck in your head, for me it's been Rosa Dear by Ruth.


	3. Moleskine Notebook

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Castiel's sonnet for his soulmate falls into unexpected hands, and he doesn't know how to feel.

_Wednesday_

Castiel had known who his soulmate was forever, it seemed. The only one to ever make his head turn or force the words to die on the tip of his tongue. The only one he’d ever slowed down to watch in the hallway. The only one, it seemed, who’d _never_ look his way. The one and only Dean Winchester, green-eyed, freckle-skinned demon of his wildest dreams. And the cause of a perpetual burn upon his wrist in the few classes they shared. 

“Hi, Castiel,” the girl said, giggling and hurrying by. He turned to watch as she retreated and groaned. That was the fourth one today, and he _really_ didn’t feel like talking to girls. Moleskine notebook tucked under one arm, he set out for biology. 

A brown leather jacket brushed past in the hallway and his wrist flared hot for an instant. He flinched. Turning as quickly as he could in the crowded hall, he craned to see the figure who had caused his bracelet to react so sharply. He spotted no one, as the crush of bodies consumed the space where the boy had walked last. 

Sitting up front in the biology lab, Castiel allowed his pencil to wander freely as he listened to the teacher discuss Gregor Mendel’s famous experiment. He flipped to the last written line in his notebook and continued where it left off. 

It was a poem, or at least the draft of one. Castiel’s English teacher had recommended poetry as a way to calm himself down when things were moving too quickly, though he used it more to organize thoughts. His latest spoke of green eyes and honey and warmth. Of his soulmate. He’d crossed out the references to the name and any pronouns, though. His parents needn’t know his soulmate wasn’t a girl, after all. _Especially_ if they came to watch the annual poetry recitation event that was mandatory for every student in Honors English. The girl to Castiel’s left, Pamela, raised a hand and addressed their teacher mid-sentence. 

“How do genetics play into soulmates? ‘Cause I found my soulmate and we’re gonna be together forever.” Lowering her hand, she turned and whispered to Castiel, “Unless you’ve got a better offer, sweetheart.” 

Castiel’s heart jolted, and his soulmate bracelet had never felt so cold against his skin. 

***

English class rolled around a few periods later, and Castiel took up his customary seat in the back corner. The board read “Work Day: Poems Due Next Class” in his teacher’s neat, even handwriting. He gingerly opened his notebook and flipped to the latest poem. Warm bubbles filled his chest and he smiled to himself, glancing up from the page to scan the room. Dean Winchester sat in the far corner, heels up on the desk, staring absently out the window. A bee flitted by and settled on a nearby flower just outside Dean’s line of sight, but Castiel noticed. 

“A bee,” he said under his breath, smiling gently. He watched for a moment then turned back to his notebook, soulmate bracelet cooling off as his attention turned from the people in the room back to his work. He didn’t hear the footsteps quietly approach his desk, just saw the hand as it snatched his notebook away. 

“Whatcha got here, Novak?” The words drawled across Castiel’s skin, prickling like spiders as he scrambled frantically for his notebook back as the taller man loomed over him. He bristled, and tried to snatch it way before Dean could read anything. He lifted it away and began reading dramatically aloud. 

Their soul gleams bright, with fire or angel’s song.  
Forested eyes spark tales of roads not crossed  
And pierce clearly through fog and highways long  
Through rosy lips, they tell me all is lost  
As the heart of my soulmate lays with her. 

The room was absolutely silent save the quiet gasps quickly stifled. Then, Dean spoke. 

“You write sonnets a lot, Cas?” he asked. 

Castiel balked, but answered. “For anyone worth it, I’d rival Shakespeare’s own works. Come hear more, this Saturday, when you don't have to steal my notebook. I'll be taking that back, now,” he finished, rising and tugging his notebook gently from Dean’s limp hand. The class stood dumbfounded, processing the quiet nerd who'd just not only spoken directly to Dean Winchester, but who’d outright challenged him. Disgruntled, Castiel turned once about the class. “These poems are due soon. Best to get working.” 

“I'll be there, Cas,” Dean murmured, and slunk back to the corner. 

No more words cut the air of the most silent Honors English class to date, everyone’s heads bowed working the entire period. Castiel's mind was elsewhere. Namely, Dean. 

_I just essentially told my soulmate who I was, right? That's what happened? But he’s with that girl, Pamela. Wait, heavens, did I just come out to the class? No, no pronouns. Okay. Focus, Castiel. Dean’s gonna be there this weekend. He doesn't know you’re his soulmate, but he knows they’ll be there. Just find him and tell him. Be brave._ and the bell jolted him from his thoughts. Assembly time, and he ran dead-out to find Balthazar before the bell rang again. 

He heard a voice call after him as he bolted from the English room, a loud “Cas!”, but only one person called him that and it’s the one person who couldn't know his problem. His soulmate band gave an icy twang as he left Dean's proximity. 

_I'll come back for you._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! As always, comments and kudos are SUPER appreciated and help me want to write more Destiel, faster. 
> 
> Please don't judge my disappointing poetry-writing skills, but I wanted to try it out;) Chapters from here on out will alternate between Dean and Castiel's perspectives, 'cause why not?
> 
> Leave song recommendations in the comments! I do listen to them! Whoever's recommended things so far, they're in my driving playlist! Stay safe, shippers.


	4. Kouple's Karaoke

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A break-up, a song, and "el prime hospital": Dean's got a big storm coming on Saturday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine's Day! I swore I'd get this fic updated while it was still ~thematically appropriate~, and dear Chuck is this cutting it close. 
> 
> The lyrics in this chapter are from San Antone by The Ghost of Paul Revere, a lovely, lovely song I first read about in a fic by CBFirestarter. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

Dean was having a bad hour. 

His soulmate bracelet was going to leave a red welt on his arm at this rate, since it hadn’t cooled off since he walked into the English room, which was completely nonsensical because Pamela’s class was on the other side of the building. Maybe he was just thinking about her a lot. 

Or not. 

Dean was growing more and more suspicious that Pamela was his soulmate, seeing as the leather band around his arm had never once grown hot with friction when she hugged him, and he’d never once felt the same nervous tension in his chest as he did when it truly did heat up. And the fact he was growing to dread her company. _Hmm._

Thoughtlessly, in a haze, he pulled his cell phone from the pocket of his jacket and wrote a new message to her. 

>> i dont think we’re really soulmates, pamela... i havent been completely honest with you. im breaking up with you, so your heart is free today on valentines day. please dont be mad... we’re just not meant to be. i love you anyways, and ill always be your best friend. 

A “send” button later, and he was done. Single. 

Dean sighed heavily, and his mind whirred faster still as he trudged to the auditorium for their daily announcements. He shoved open the door, and warmer air from inside rushed out to greet him. The room was still nearly empty, rows upon rows of wooden folding seats set facing a large stage at the far end of the room, soldiers waiting at attention. Class having just let out, and everyone usually hovering outside until the last possible second, Dean settled into his seat at the back, in the middle of the last row, and closed his eyes to think in the few minutes of silence until the deluge. He just broke up with Pamela. His heart sank through the floor as the reality settled over him. He ran one finger absentmindedly over the worn leather on his wrist, now cool to the touch. His mind wandered absently, pacing back through the morning. Back to English. Back to the face of Castiel Novak, eyes fearful on his as Dean read his poem aloud. Back to the date he’d told him: Saturday. Three days from today. The same night his soulmate had told him to come find out who they were. _My soulmate who isn’t Pamela,_ he thought cautiously. _At least I can kill two birds with one stone,_ he mused, before shaking himself from the reverie as the door to the auditorium swung open with a bang behind him and the torrent was upon him. 

“Dean Winchester!” 

Pamela, makeup smudged halfway down her face, stalked in, eyes blazing through a glaze of tears. She grabbed his arm and ripped off the soulmate bracelet, clasp snapping apart as she threw it to the floor. “I cannot _believe_ you’d do this to me. We’re _soulmates_! I promise! We’re meant to —”

She was never given a chance to finish. 

“I believe if Dean doesn’t wish to be your boyfriend anymore you’re in no way able to force him to do so,” a gravelly voice interrupted. Dean flushed hot with embarrassment as his savior made their identity known: Novak. His sharp blue eyes looked dangerous, flashing silver in the harsh fluorescent light cascading from above, and Dean felt his heart stutter as he took in the other man fully. His hair stuck up wildly from his head, dark brown and windblown and… _hot_. He swallowed against a sudden pressure rising in his throat and the sudden heat settling low in his stomach, and watched as Pamela prowled away, delicately swiping at her eyes. Dean turned to Castiel as he started to speak again, voice low and serious and pressing into Dean's skin like beads of rain. 

“Would you mind if I sat here? Assembly’s about to start and I don't need another tardy for not being in a seat in time.” 

Several seconds passed, Dean gawking at the man before him and Castiel waiting awkwardly for Dean’s okay. Dean was rather busy contemplating Castiel’s jawline, and it took a clearing of a throat and the mass shuffling of the crowd of high schoolers through the doors behind them for Dean to finally answer, choking out a brief “sure, Cas” before collapsing slowly into the wooden seat behind him. Castiel stuck his hand out awkwardly for a handshake, but when Dean failed to reciprocate he clapped him lightly on the shoulder instead before flinching away violently. 

“Oh, sorry, did I shock you?” Dean asked, snapping from his daze at his sudden movement. Castiel merely stared, wide-eyed, at his wrist. 

“It’s nothing,” he muttered, before settling down next to Dean as the music started to fade out. “Just a thought.” 

The student council president began announcements, Balthazar’s distinctive British accent cut through the last straggling whispers in the crowd. “Today, seeing as it’s Valentine’s Day, we’re going to do something different! I like to call it Kouple’s Karaoke, with two K’s, and we need two audience members for this.” A flashy PowerPoint flickered onto the projector screen behind him. He strutted across the stage, tailored shirt wrapping itself neatly around his waist as he pointed to the way back of the room, almost directly at Dean. “Cassie! Why don’t you come on down here, and bring that lovely man next to you with you?” 

The spotlight swung around the room to center on Castiel, who was completely stiff next to Dean. His eyes were wider than a deer’s in headlights, a look Dean quickly mirrored as he realized what the situation implied.  
_I have to sing a duet. A love song. With Castiel. I barely know him, though, and I'm certainly not his Valentine!_

Castiel grabbed his hand and pulled him upright, and together they shuffled from their row down to the front. Dean felt a gentle pressure on his hand, and he squeezed right back, hoping Cas caught the message he tried to send through the gesture. They marched stoically towards the stage, ignoring the whispers and soft catcalls from the jocks in the front row. 

“It’ll be alright, Cas. Just one song, then back to your pretty little girlfriend,” Dean joked, heart clenching unexpectedly hard as he said it. He didn’t notice Cas freeze up, or the panic that flashed across his face. Dean was lost in his own world, anxiety clouding his head. He’s good at math, not standing in front of a crowd. He's especially not good at standing in front of a crowd, singing a love song with an inordinately hot guy with pretty eyes and wild hair and _God, Dean, pull it together._ Balthazar tugged them both on stage, pushing them towards a lone mic in the dead center. Castiel shifted his grip on Dean’s hand, but didn’t let go. 

“Let’s let our _lovebirds_ choose their song now, shall we?” Balthazar asked with a smirk and an eyebrow cock, accentuating the word and winking at Cas. 

“I’ll kill you, Bal, this is not what I meant,” Castiel shot, before Dean cut him off. 

“San Antone, you know it?” he asked, shooting Castiel a side-eye look that screamed _don’t worry, I’ve got this._ Internally, he felt the opposite. Social interaction is a fourteen-alarm fire in Dean’s book, and he really preferred to stick to research, his small group of friends, and his brother. 

Balthazar was taken aback by Dean’s quick response, but nodded nonetheless. “Let’s give it up for our lovely demonstrators, and everyone remember to come out today at lunch to see more just like this! 12:45, right here!” The acoustic guitar intro started up as the title switched onto the giant screen. Dean pulled the mic close to his mouth with his left hand, right hand still tight on Cas’s left. 

Without thinking, he began: 

_I lost my heart in the heat of San Antone_  
_I found my love in the cold of the great, white north_  
_I watched my lover roll me over like a river stone_  
_Well you’ve got pain in your bones, you know you’re not alone._

He stopped singing for a moment, the instrumental background carrying on as he whispered to Cas. “Sing,” he pleaded softly, “you’ll catch on.” 

Castiel took a deep breath, before reading the words off the screen in front of them. Hesitantly, tentatively, he continued, reading from the screen before them: 

_And I said, let me be your hunger pains_  
_Coursing through those pretty veins_  
_Let your heart not be estranged_  
_Let me be your hunger pains._

He turned to Dean with a breathless smile, and Dean’s heart soared. He leaned in closer on an impulse, milking the spotlight for all it was worth in his moment of adrenaline-fueled bravery and beaming at Cas, the hundreds of sets of eyes fading into the background in the face of the ocean-blue ones fixed on his own. He smiled brightly back at him, face flushed and pink from nerves. Dean, anxious thoughts forgotten in the euphoria of singing, belted the second verse, Cas joining him where he could. Their voices twined together in harmony, Dean’s sweet tenor soaring on the higher notes as Cas’s baritone growled the accents. They whirled through the end of the song, worries forgotten and the hundreds of people before them irrelevant in the moment. Castiel lightly squeezed Dean’s hand as the song faded out. 

For a forced duet between friends, the weight of the chemistry in the room crackled in the air and most students sat, eyes glued to the pair as they stepped back from the mic. 

“Happy Valentine’s Day, Dean,” he said over the smattering of applause rippling through the crowd. There were few people paying much attention to the announcements at this point, and Dean felt the icy burn from Pamela’s gaze hot across his cheek. He nervously reached for his bracelet, seeking the comforting worn leather, but his wrist was bare. Balthazar shuffled them offstage as the applause died out, and Castiel released Dean’s hand at long last. The loss of sensation heightened the other missing feeling: the bracelet present since his tenth birthday, the one he’d never taken off. 

His head was spinning, and the bare ring of skin on his wrist was cold and unfamiliar against his skin. 

***

Dean was still having a bad hour, but for different reasons now. 

His bisexuality was roaring angrily in his chest, a demon torn between chasing after Pamela and kissing her until he was numb again and daydreaming of blue eyes and a deep voice, singing a chorus next to him, holding his hand tight to keep him stable. 

Castiel. 

The sparks that shot through his bones when he looked at him traced lines of lightning over his nerves. The tingling in his shoulder, where Cas had patted him before the fiasco, burned hot. The empty place on his wrist, no longer sheathed in leather, was numb from loss of sensation. 

It had to be somewhere in the auditorium, he reasoned, but the hecticness of the karaoke and breaking up with Pamela—

Pamela. 

His best friend, who’d never speak to him again over a misunderstanding. Who’d asked him out because she loved him, because she wanted to feel a forever kind of feeling with him. Forever. 

Who was fading from the shattered-heart ache in his mind in favor of another face, one with warm hands and a notebook. 

One who had girls trailing him in the hallways. 

Dean’s mind cleared abruptly when he realized he was in the parking lot, having left the auditorium and walked straight without stopping. Checking the battered metal watch on his wrist, he realized he was about to be late for calculus, and his teacher would absolutely murder him despite his near-perfect average if he slipped in after the bell again. Sighing heavily, he broke out in a dead run for the math wing, brisk February air soothing down the boiling confusion and pain in his gut. 

***

The oblivion of a topic he understood was a welcome relief, settling heavily into his customary chair and pulling out his binder moments before the bell rang. Retrieving his homework, neat columns of variables and lines criss-crossing the page, he stood up to turn it in. The repetitive nature of the class calmed him, and the orderly nature of the room brought his frayed nerves to a rest. He felt eyes on him as he stood in line, and turned around towards the narrow window in the door. Blue eyes, wide-open, caught his own, and Castiel gestured for him to come to the door. Dean lightly shook his head, his strange behavior unexpected for someone Dean had just begun to be friends with and only sung one forced duet with him, scribbling a note out on a sheet of looseleaf in his binder. “You going Saturday?” was all it read, and he held it up for Cas to read. Squinting briefly, then nodding. Dean closed his eyes and smiled, letting out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. 

_The cute boy’s actually going to go,_ he mused, before catching his own thoughts. He winced. _Stop being so gay, Dean, this one’s straight. He's got to be. Let it go, he doesn’t like you._ The thought hit him hard in the throat, his breath snagging with a startling amount of force as he plastered on a smile for his teacher. 

“Excellent work, Dean,” she said, noting a “10” across the top of his paper and handing it back. The class returned to their seats, rustling for paper and pencils and their last remaining shreds of sanity before attempting another day’s worth of math. Dean’s homework for the night lay complete in his textbook, null-sets nearly absent with the presence of the new rule they were slated to learn that day. The teacher, blue plaid dress swishing delicately, stepped to the board. 

L’Hopital’s rule was nothing compared to the thoughts swirling in his head. 

_~~~ Earlier ~~~_

_“El prime hospital,” Sam murmured, thumbing over the title on Dean’s textbook page. His hair was growing long and floppy now, falling over his eyes as he leaned across the table to watch his brother work. “Wassit for?” he asked, eighth-grade geometry no match at all for the numbers and symbols across the page._

_“You wouldn’t get it, Sammy. Maybe when you’re in high school,” Dean replied, deftly closing the book. “I need to talk to you about something, though,” he added, sucking in a breath and eyeing Sam’s reaction._

_Sam blinked, and nodded._

_Dean exhaled slowly, then stated matter-of-factly, “I’m bi.” He stared expectantly at his younger brother, who simply pushed his hair from his face and smiled. Dean frowned. “C’mon, say something. Sammy?”_

_Sam paused, consideration and affection slicing through his face. “This change anything?” he finally asked, doubt rising in his words._

_“Nothing at all.”_

_Sam smiled widely. “Don’t think I didn’t already know, De,” he quipped, before unfolding himself gazelle-like from the chair and coming to hug his brother tightly, spindly teenage arms in a too-big hoodie wrapping themselves around him in an awkward display of affection._

_~~~Now~~~_

Dean remembered this interaction with his brother fondly, but could really have done without the consequences. Every single guy in Dean’s grade had been pointed out, as Sam put it, as a “potential soulmate.” Never mind Dean’s bracelet never so much as twinged in their presences. But now… 

Castiel was different, and he’d slammed into Dean’s life in a sonnet and a song.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope that made up for some of the painfully short updates in the past. I'm going to start updating at *least* every Thursday, so look out for those if you like! 
> 
> As always, leaving kudos if this wasn't a waste of your time is appreciated greatly. I thrive on validation and dark chocolate. Comments are also lovely, I like chatting with people about Destiel so... woo. 
> 
> Also as always, drop me a song recommendation in the comments! Music's neat, I'm a band nerd so orchestral is appreciated as well. 
> 
> Random notes: my school really does do a karaoke thing once a month, they did try to force people to do it, and I do, in fact, call L'Hopital's rule "el prime hospital". It's more fun that way.


	5. Cas, Interrupted.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A car, and a rabbit. (and a really bad title...)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To those of you who've stuck with this since the beginning, I'm sorry but also thank you for tolerating me! I love you all, come say hi in the comments or come say hi on [my tumblr](https://catstrophysics.tumblr.com/)

Castiel’s ears were ringing, though that might have just been residual from him walking headfirst into a wall trying to leave the auditorium. He was going to _murder_ Balthazar. His best friend, who knew he’d been staring at Dean Winchester for years, who just forced him to sing a duet on stage. _Should probably go talk to him about that,_ Castiel mused as he headed to the library to work in his free period. The librarians usually let him hide behind the circulation desk and stamp “Property of Lebanon High” into the front covers of books, the mindless soothing his frayed nerves as he panicked over what to say to Dean. It was last period and the wind had picked up since earlier, whistling sharp and cold around the corners of the school, skittering leaves through the courtyard and sweeping pollen down from the big clock that tolled the hours. The brownstone library towered over one side of the big grassy mound in the middle of the courtyard, and Castiel pulled the creaky old door open, relishing the toasty air inside and the quiet, well-ordered atmosphere. 

 

“Hi Ms. Smith,” he smiled as he slipped behind the desk towards the vacant well-worn leather chair, the murmurs from the overfilled library soft in the background as he pulled the “To Be Checked In” bin closer, breathing in the vanilla scent of dozens upon dozens of books. His soulmate bracelet hangs gently from his wrist, black leather and silver studs cool in the cozy heat of the library. He inks up the stamp, flicking the date up from yesterday’s, and zones out entirely, stopping only to push locks of his unruly hair back. His phone buzzes in his pocket and he slips it out, unlocking it with a swipe. 

>>cassie get out to the parking lot  
>>theres a bunny in the road and it looks hurt  
>>it wont let me get close enough  
>> castiel  
>>c  
>>a  
>>s  
>>t  
>>i  
>>e  
>>l  
>>castiel seriously  
>>hurry

Castiel sucks in a breath as he skims Balthazar’s messages. Everyone close to him knew he was essentially an animal whisperer, even the most skittish kittens allowing him close enough for chin scratches and ear rubs. The Dean-based stresses of the day fell from his shoulders in favor of a new terror: _bunny._

“See you later, Mrs. Smith,” Castiel half-yells as he runs from the library, forgetting to even set down the stamp in his haste. The parking lot is fortunately right out front, and he sees Balthazar waving frantically from the far corner. As Castiel runs closer, cold air snapping through his windblown hair, he spots the little thing. It’s solid black, not a speck of light across its body, collapsed directly in the entrance. One rear leg is bent out at an odd angle, and its eyes are wide in abject terror. He slows to a fast walk as he gets closer, not wanting to startle it into further injury or worse, lashing out. 

“Bal,” Castiel whispered, beckoning his friend closer. “Where’s your car?” He looked around the lot for Balthazar’s electric blue Mustang, but it was nowhere to be seen. Castiel turned to face him fully and raised an eyebrow, and Balthazar smiled sheepishly. “Balthazar…” Castiel added warningly. 

“It’s in the shop,” he finally admitted. 

“The shop,” Castiel repeated, incredulously. Balthazar nodded solemnly. 

“So you see _why_ I needed you. Both your, er, lagomorph handling talent and your access to a vehicle.” Balthazar punctuated himself by clapping Castiel hard on the back, silver bangle jangling in his ear as he pushed him forward. 

 

Castiel sighed heavily, before turning his attention back to the trembling rabbit before him. “Kneel down,” he ordered in a stage whisper and Balthazar complied, dropping silently to sit back on his heels. He edged forward, one hand out in front of him in a fist. The bunny’s nose quivered, and it tried for a tentative shuffle towards Castiel. 

A big, sleek, shiny black car zipped around the corner behind Balthazar, tires squealing as the driver slammed on the brakes, and Castiel’s world went dark with a thunderclap. 

***

Cool water dripped down the side of his head, and he vaguely registered Balthazar’s “he’s awake” before the ringing started, shrill shrieking crashing through his skull and echoing into screaming feedback. He flickered his eyes open for a split second, but the fluorescent lights overhead had him slamming them shut again. His heartbeat thrummed behind his eyelids, and he became aware of a gentle pressure on his chest. Curiosity got the better of him, and he opened his left eye slowly to assess the weight. Two liquid brown eyes blinked at him, and he groaned. 

“A rabbit,” he mumbled. “There’s a rabbit on my chest.” 

A familiar drawl cut into his eardrums, and Castiel’s eyes shot open. The world settled down into a blurry amalgamation of shapes, two figures discernible against the blinding white background of hospital walls. “She wouldn’t sit anywhere else calmly, and I didn’t want her getting more hurt.” A hand patted his hip apologetically, and he tried to sit up before strong, warm hands grabbed his shoulders and pushed him gently back down. Something mechanical beeped nearby, and the stabbing, burning pain in his arm forced itself into notice. 

He tried to conceal the jolt of pain throughout his body as every single square inch of skin suddenly on fire or freezing or numb or an unholy combination of all three. 

“What the _hell_ ,” he began, “am I—”

“Doing here?” Balthazar cut in. “Well, Cassie, Dean-o here hit you with his car to put it, ahem, bluntly.” Balthazar settled back against the guard rail on the bed, tense worry boiling underneath his calm, nonchalant facade. Castiel turned to confront Dean as his vision cleared enough for him to realize it was indeed the gorgeous man sitting at the foot of his bed, whose glittering eyes shone starkly from his blushing face. 

“Didn’t mean to hit you with a car,” he mumbled. “And your soulmate bracelet came off in the chaos, you wanna get it back on before it burns a hole in my pocket? Damn thing hasn’t cooled off since I picked it up.” He held out the black strip of leather, wincing as it lightly cooked his fingers. “You and Balthazar soulmates, then? I mean, for it to be this hot, it’s gotta be someone standing right here.” He jiggled the bracelet, and Castiel tried to reach forward to take it. His arm gave another throb, interrupting his attempt, and he finally mustered up the stability of mind to turn his attention to it. His appendage was cocooned in a nest of white gauze and pointy metal bits. Dean sighed lightly, and dropped the bracelet onto the sickly blue hospital sheets by Castiel’s leg. 

“So’re you two… together?” He asked, stuttering out the question He rubbed one finger carefully over the pale ring around his own wrist as Castiel blanched, flushed, and then turned tomato red. Balthazar excused himself to the bathroom as he cackled maniacally. 

Castiel took a shaky breath to steady himself, and tried to ball his hands into fists but remembered that both wouldn’t work with his arms currently completely immobilized and also would hurt like hell. “Of course we’re not, Dean, and do you have a new girlfriend since the break-up?” He tried to sound nonchalant, but the question, pretending Dean wasn’t _his_ burned more sharply than any of his injuries. His voice quavered. The heart-rate monitor beeped slightly faster as adrenaline shot through his body, and he slowly raised one hand to pat the rabbit nibbling on his hospital gown. 

Dean blinked at him for a moment, looking almost contemplative, before admitting, “Can’t find my bracelet. Think Pamela’s got it, but I dunno for sure. Wish I did, think I might be onto something about a certain someone.” He tossed Castiel a crooked, weary smile before continuing. “How ‘bout you? If not Balthazar—” 

“I’d really rather not answer that, Dean.” 

He flinched away hard, before forcing a smile back onto his face. “Not like you can wear the bracelet right now, anyways, eh? What’re you gonna name the bunny?” he asked, stretching out two fingers to scritch under its chin. The rabbit twitches its nose and sidles closer to Dean. 

“Hmm, how about… Lucifer?” Castiel joked, but Dean broke into a grin. 

“ _Perfect!_ ” 

“Should we see about getting me out of this bed and taking Luci here to the animal hospital for a quick check-up?” Castiel wondered, adding his own hand alongside Dean’s. The fingers on his left hand gave a pulse as he tried to lift the second arm, and he winced. “I’ll be okay, but if this little guy has anything up we’ll need to know.” 

“How are you feeling?” Dean asked, uncharacteristic worry slipping into his eyes. He abandoned Lucifer’s tiny, furry chin in favor of resting a hand on Castiel’s healthy forearm, as he gave him a twice-over. 

Castiel didn’t answer immediately, preferring to take in the sterile environment around him. The various monitors hooked up to him beeped steadily and softly, and the calm of the hospital room soothed his whirling insides. Footsteps paused outside his door, but retreated without entering. He took in his available hand, noting the bluish tinge across his knuckles and the raw, red scrapes snaking up his wrist. 

“I’ve been better,” he admitted, before falling silent again. “Hey, Dean?” he added after a few moments’ silence. 

“Yeah, Cas?” 

“Why are you here? I mean,” he stuttered, backtracking when the confusion hit Dean’s eyes, “we’re barely acquaintances and you’d never talked to me before a few days ago. Then that whole karaoke fiasco,” he sighed, “sorry about that, again, and now you’re sitting by my bedside in the hospital. And we named a rabbit together.” He trailed into silence, his throbbing headache roaring back as he forced his blurry eyes to focus on Dean’s own. 

“Cas, I am the one that _hit_ you with the car,” he reminded, “but we’re also friends, I think. You stood up for me against Pamela, who, let’s face it was going to rip me a new one if you didn’t step in. And,” he continued, “I dunno, I felt sorta a connection in English class? You know? Like a friendship spark?” 

A wave of warm comfort washed over him, before being replaced by a icy pang. _Friend. Dean just thinks of me as a friend._ He smiled softly. “I felt something, too.” 

The grin that stretched across Dean’s face almost made getting hit by a car worth it, even as the painkillers wore off more and the ache settled heavily into his bones and his pulse pounded in his bandaged arm.


	6. Hospital Bed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Castiel wakes up in the hospital with a disoriented Dean in a chair next to him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took me way too damn long, but all of the thanks to [@verifiedfangirl16](https://archiveofourown.org/users/verifiedfangirl16/pseuds/verifiedfangirl16) for the comments that inspired me to actually get back into working on this fic. I hope this does it some justice.

_Thursday_

Castiel blinked awake to a darkened room, a lone patch of light falling on the rumpled shape in the chair pulled next to his hospital bed. Even in the half-light, the leather jacket and golden hair were unmistakable. 

“Dean?” he croaked, startling himself with the pitchless rasp in his throat. He swallowed hard, and his headache came roaring back. Actually, scratch that, his _everything_ ache came roaring back. Fancy that, getting hit by a car really leaves a mark. He tried again. “Hello, Dean?” 

“Hnngh? Yeah?” the shape slurred, stirring slowly and stretching. “Cas? Shit, where am I?” Dean groaned to a sitting position, rolled his neck back and forth a few times with a cacophony of cracks, and then went wide-eyed, staring at the wall clock like it had just materialized before his eyes. 

“Dean, you're in the hospita—”

“It’s one o’ clock in the morning? What’m I doing here? Wait, son of a bitch,” he said, feeling around on his empty wrist, “I'm missing my bracelet still. Goddammit.”

“Dean, slow down,” Castiel began, but Dean’s blurry shape continued to shift and swim before his eyes.

Presently, Dean was engaged in about the furthest thing from slowing down as possible, pacing lines across the linoleum like it was going out of style. 

“Shit, shit, okay. Okay. The rabbit. Lucifer. Gotta get it somewhere. Wait. No. Gotta find it first. And my bracelet. Goddamn Pamela.” As he wore holes in the floor with his furious pace, he ticked items off on his fingers. “And gotta call Sammy. Shit, phone. Okay. Phone, Sammy, animal hospital, Pamela, Cas.” He whirled on his heel to face Castiel, who stared back with a mixture of blurry comprehension and fondness, a faintly confused smile atop his lips. 

“Yeah, Dean?”

“You need me to get you the homework? For English? And are you still able to perform on Saturday? God, sunshine, I'm so sorry. This is all my fault. Can you even walk? I’m. I’m—”

“Dean.” Castiel cut his spiraling off sharply, then grinned, ignoring the fact that the action was liable to actually rip his skull in half. “I don't blame you. This isn't your fault. I'll come to school today, of course, but might need a little help.” He fumbled for the remote to the bed, raising himself to a sitting position with the help of the motorized backrest. “Come here, please?” He gestured to the chair Dean has slept in, and fiddles with the patch of gauze covering a needle in the back of his hand. 

“Dude. Don’t mess with your IV,” Dean says as he settles back down in the chair, slipping his leather jacket off casually. “What do you need? I’ll do anything. Cas, I’m so sor—” 

“When did you start calling me ‘Cas?’” he cut in. 

Dean paused for a moment, grabbing for his bracelet only for Castiel to notice him falter when he grasped bare wrist once again. “Why?” His eyes shot back and forth across Castiel’s face, desperate to settle anywhere other than his wide blue eyes. 

“You’ve called me ‘Novak’ for as long as I’ve known you. Why ‘Cas’ now?” 

“I don’t know, man,” he huffed, “my soulmate bracelet was on _fire_ that day in English and I wasn’t thinking straight.” 

Rather than respond, Castiel simply regarded him evenly with two blue eyes. Dean fidgeted under the stare, carding a hand through his hair and looking away. Cautiously, looking as though he was terrified of being burned by Castiel’s gaze, he turned his eyes back up. Green met blue, and held longer than was strictly friendly under current social norms. Castiel shifted closer to the edge of the bed, swinging his feet down from the edge and dutifully ignoring the alarm bells and sirens of pain shrieking in his head. 

“You know,” Dean whispered, and then simply stared. “The day I read your poem.” 

The heart rate and blood pressure monitor behind Dean was going absolutely wild at this point, but neither of the boys seemed to notice or care. Dean lifted one hand to brush Castiel’s hair back from his forehead with a feather-light touch. A quiet smile slipped across his mouth, creeping from one corner across to the next as if it were afraid to be seen, passing inch-by-inch on quiet cat paws. Castiel reached his own hand up, the one pierced by the IV but otherwise unencumbered, and placed it atop Dean’s, hot against his cheek. 

“Dean?” He asked, swinging his legs back and forth over the side of the bed. 

“Yeah, Cas?” 

“Who has your bracelet, again? Pamela?” Internally, he burned at the name, her disregard of Dean’s words and wishes searing more pain into his heart than all the times he’d had to ignore his feelings for the gorgeous caramel-haired boy before him. 

“Yeah, why?” 

“Hand me my phone, please,” he said, still staring Dean dead in the eyes, daring him to question this. To his credit, Dean didn’t ask a single question, merely brought Castiel his phone and waited as he sent a brief text. Looking back up and switching the device off, Castiel asked, “What happened to Lucifer? The rabbit? He’s okay, right?” 

Dean grimaced. “You didn’t hear me earlier? Can’t find him. Hospital people probably took him away for now, but he’s not the priority. You are, Cas. We gotta get you better.”

The warm glow in Castiel’s chest swelled, filling up his achey limbs with a new sense of contentment. “‘We?’” he asked, confused. 

“Yeah, ‘we,’ I’m the one who did this to you and, damn it, I’m going to help you back out of it. You want me to help get your bracelet back on, now that you’ve got a free arm?” 

Castiel nodded eagerly, holding out his IV-bound hand for it. Dean scooped it up from the bedspread where he’d dropped it the night before. 

Dean chuckled. “Still pretty friggin’ hot, so be careful, I don’t want you hurt any worse now that we’re finally getting you a bit patched up. I’m gonna go call Charlie, so you should probably get some rest, you know,” he sighed, “heal up and all that. I’ll look for Lucifer afterwards.” He stood, reaching out for the edge of Castiel’s thin bedsheet to smooth it into place. Castiel smiled softly up at him, a paper-thin cut across his cheek that the nurses failed to bandage shining red in the lights. 

“Goodbye, Dean.” 

“See ya, Cas.” 

As soon as the door had swung shut, Castiel pulled his moleskine notebook and a pencil from his backpack, and tucked the black bracelet in a side pocket. The heat emanating from it had _definitely_ confirmed one thing: Dean Winchester was his soulmate. He tore a page from the book, tracing his cast-bound fingers over the jagged edges from where two other pages had been removed, and began to write. 

_Dean,_  
_Your bracelet’s fire is always handy when looking for answers, but you had to have felt a spark, too. Thank you for staying with me._

The leather jacket had sat forgotten, nestled in the bedside chair. Castiel, with no small effort, tucked the piece of notebook paper into an inside pocket, where Dean wouldn’t find it immediately upon donning the jacket. 

“Soulmates,” he whispered, leaning the backrest back down horizontally. A problem for when he awoke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, it felt good to get another chapter on here. I've also (finally) gone through and edited some stuff back into its proper place, which is nice. Also, if you've never read [Dreaming in Digital](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13566900/chapters/31135188) by ltleflrt then you should definitely go do that. It's so good. Also watch "Good Omens" on Amazon Prime. 
> 
> Space fact: Did you know, according to scientists, any sort of life on Mars would look pretty similar to pasta? 
> 
> Please please PLEASE leave me kudos or comments if you've enjoyed this fic at all! Have a fantastic day.


	7. Lucifer Rising

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucifer's back, and Dean learns something surprising about Castiel.

The door swung shut behind Dean, and he was already dialing Charlie’s number. She picked up on the first ring, before his fraying nerves had ten seconds to splinter even farther apart. Another credit to her and her ability to answer the phone at 1:17 in the goddamn morning. 

“Hiya, Dea—”

 

“It’s Cas. Castiel. Blue eyes. Whatever,” he babbled, talking right over her and without so much as a hello. 

“Hold on. Novak? That pretty guy you always check out?” The amusement in her voice was palpable, and Dean was having exactly none of it. 

“Yes. Novak. We’re soulmates, I’m sure of it. We have to be. Char, what even.” 

 

She snorted a quiet laugh into her phone, but indulged him nonetheless. “Alright, Winchester, start from the beginning. _Don’t_ leave anything out.” 

He took a deep breath, pulling his scattering thoughts back into his head. “Okay. So. I don’t know for absolute sure, ‘cause Pamela still has my—” 

“Bracelet, yeah, yeah, whatever, did you kiss him? Ask him out? Get to the good part,” she interrupted. 

“Didn’t kiss him. Hit him with a car. My car. Um, there was a rabbit, a rabbit, well, his rabbit now, or our rabbit, we named it Lucifer. Named him Lucifer, that is, and Charlie, do you think Pamela has my soulmate bracelet? And is today Thursday? I need that bracelet. And a poem. God, Char, I need to write a poem. A poem,” the words were tumbling out at this point, too much emotion built up to even be coherent at this point, and Charlie was cackling loudly into the phone. 

“Dean, Dean, oh my God, Dean,” she gasped. “Castiel just texted me about your soulmate bracelet. Literally just now. I swear on Dumbledore’s grave.” 

 

If he’d been any less tired, he would have started raging. Instead, the cold fear within him, threatening just at the edge of blinding, boiling fury, settled into calm. _Cas,_ he thought. _Looking out for me, and I haven’t done anything for you._

“Oh,” he sighed. “What about it? You gonna get Pam to give it back or somethin’?” He hoped the brunette would hand it over without a fight, but the outcome was really much closer to another screaming match, interspersed with bouts of crying. 

 

“Yeah,” Charlie answered, stifling a yawn, “I told her to quit screwing around with your heart and give it back, already. Anyways,” she continued, far too brightly for this godforsaken hour, “who’re you thinking your soulmate is?” 

Dean started to speak, but she cut back in before he could even properly inhale. 

“Oh, right, you find out Saturday at that poetry thing. Dorothy and I are probably going to go, oh _right Dean did I tell you_?” 

“Tell me what, Char?” The suspicion was heavily evident in his voice. Surprises from Charlie usually ended up with Dean explaining something highly questionable to a few very unamused cops, or with fragments of memories he’d rather not have. _Like the last time she got involved with a potential soulmate,_ he remembered with a wince. _That_ had been a nightmare. He shook himself quietly out of his reminisces, and asked again, “What?” 

“Dorothy—the pretty Dorothy from my astronomy class, ya know, with the, with the motorcycle?—we’re together! There was something up with her soulmate bracelet but she got it fixed and it was so hot it _burned_ her wrist! I had to go and get ‘er some ice. Dude. She’s amazing. So funny and tough and _ugh_ ,” which was punctuated with the sort of loud _thud_ that either means someone just clocked her over the head with a brick or she’d slumped happily onto the desk. He had a strong sense that it was the second one, especially when she resumed speaking, muffled by the desk. 

“But enough about me. How’s your boyfriend?” she teased, and Dean gasped. 

“He’s not my boyfriend. But Saturday is two days away, so I’ll probably have a girlfriend by then. Or a boyfriend. God, Char, I don’t know anymore. Cas is hot. Friggin’ hot,” he continued, as though an elaboration was necessary, but she interjected. 

“I’ll get Pamela to bring your bracelet to school tomorrow, she’ll listen if she knows what’s good for her.” Another stifled yawn. “You bringin’ Novak back from the hospital in the A.M.?” 

As if on autopilot, Dean corrected her. “Cas,” he said, without even a second thought. “And yeah. Let him get some shut-eye, then I’ll get him to school. Talked to the hospital desk lady, she’s gonna give us a ton of aspirin to get him through. Looked him over, not much screwed up ‘cept for his arm. Hey, Char,” he said, checking his watch, “I’m gonna go back to Cas and see how he’s doing, I think, also Charlie, please don’t count on him being my soulmate, I really doubt he’s gay, but anyways. Please be good to yourself. See you in the daylight,” he closes with a burdened sigh. 

She took his abruptness in stride, another testament to their friendship. “See you then, Dumbledork,” she responds, and the call disconnects. 

A rushed-looking nurse clad in drab blues bustled past him. She looked like she knew what was going on, and there was something that still needed doing. 

“Ma’am? Excuse me? Ma’am?” he called, and she stopped and turned to look at him. “The guy in room 451 had a black rabbit with him, do you know where the doctor would have taken it?” 

***

Half an hour later, Dean carried a twitchy-nosed Lucifer through the door of Castiel’s hospital room. 

Remarkably, Castiel was still awake. Dean’s chair was still empty save for his jacket, and he settled right back down. He immediately gave Castiel a once-over, wincing when his eyes skimmed over the bulky cast. Castiel didn’t notice, because his eyes were fixated on something else entirely. 

“You brought Lucifer back!” he shouted, and swung to a sitting position, eagerly holding his hands out for the rabbit. 

“Yeah, buddy, here you go,” he said, handing Lucifer over. The rabbit sniffed inquisitively at Castile’s cast. He grinned widely, the white bandage on the cut on his cheek shifting as he did. 

“Thank you for finding him, Dean.” The grin that stretched across Castiel’s face was warm and sunny, even as the exhaustion in his eyes weighed him down. It looked almost affectionate, but it _couldn’t_ be. Not with Cas. Nevertheless, they locked eyes, and the heat in the room grew even more. 

“Hey,” Dean blurted, shattering the silence, “we’re getting you back to classes today, right? Poems are due, but I know you’re done with that, so there’s not much reason to stay here, right?” He waited for a nod from the boy on the bed before he continued. “I can load up all our stuff in my car so we can get to school in a few hours, you know, ‘cause it’s, um, like two in the morning? Speaking of which, you should sleep more. And drink some water. And do you need anything? And—” 

“Dean, I’m alright. Are you okay?” 

He took a moment to think about this. _No,_ he thought. _I’m not really okay, I mean, no one knows that I’m queer, and now there’s you in my life, and I think I like you, but my dad will never appro_ —

 _My dad._

The cold sweat that ran down his back was an unpleasant shock, but enough to pull him back to the present and away from the jokes his dad always used to pull when they found out about Aunty Jody’s soulmate, Donna. 

“Yeah, Cas, I’m okay. Just tired. It's nearly two, after all. We should both sleep, yeah?” 

Castiel merely nodded, scratching Lucifer between the ears, but a few seconds later added, “Do you want to take half the bed? I wouldn’t mind.” 

Dean thought he caught a glimpse of something like _hope_ in his eyes, but come on, it had to be his mind playing tricks on him. There was no way the boy before him liked him back, or even had the capacity to. _Or knows you like him_ , the voice in his head reminded. _He doesn't know anything about you._

 

“Thanks, buddy, but I’ll just keep the chair.” He shifted his weight around, pulling the worn leather jacket over his shoulder as a makeshift blanket. “You sleep well, and I’ll see you in a few hours.” 

The room went silent for a few blessed minutes, the only sound the two boys’ staggered steady breathing, before Castiel spoke. 

“By the way, I’m gay,” he said, evenly and without tripping over any words at all. Mark Dean impressed.

His heart immediately hit a pace previously unheard of in humans. “That’s–that’s cool, man. Um,” he said, trying to pull the gleeful responses in his head back under control, “why’re you telling me this?” _Why are you just confirming my hopes?_

The room went silent again, but Dean was certain Castiel could hear his heart’s valiant attempt to leap from his chest. 

“I don’t know, really,” Castiel said, and Dean’s heart nearly stopped beating, “But it might help you realize some things about yourself, too. And we’re friends, after all.” 

Soon enough, Castiel’s breathing slowed and evened out, and Dean was left alone with his thoughts. His thoughts, however, didn’t particularly want to be alone with him, and instead swirled wildly. _What did he mean, 'realize'?_ Dean's eyes shot wide open in the pitch blackness. _Does he know? You know, maybe the world would just be easier if we didn’t have soulmates…_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked it! As always, kudos and comments are appreciated wholeheartedly. I'm going to keep trying to update somewhat regularly, but a class of mine starts soon so we'll see how much time it takes up. Come say hi on Tumblr, same handle as here. 
> 
> Leave me the last song that you listened to in the comments! (I really do listen to them ;) )


	8. A Realization Dawns.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys finally make their way back to school. Dean does some thinking.

_Friday morning, 7:15 AM_

Driving to school in the morning was awkward to say the least. Even before they made it out of the hospital, still collecting paperwork and insurance bills from the front desk, Castiel had half-demanded that he was going to pay Dean back for the trouble he’d caused. Once they settled into the worn leather seats, Lucifer tucked into a nest constructed of Dean’s leather jacket and a clean blue t-shirt crumpled from its time spent under the backseat, the boys said nothing. A wary unease cloaked both of them, and the engine revving as Dean started the car caused Castiel to jump out of his skin. 

“Sorry,” he mumbled, reaching desperately for the power button on the radio. He bashed it in, waiting for something to fill the painful, biting, crushing silence. And then bashed it immediately again as something high and whiny and definitely _not_ rock blasted through the speakers and attempted to rend his eardrums in half. 

Castiel was howling with laughter next to him, tears forming in the corner of those bright blue eyes and the widest, brightest grin since the formation of the sun splitting his face straight down the middle. “Please,” he choked out around gasped laughter, “ _please_ don’t tell me that’s your taste in music.” He reached out with his cast-laden arm and laid it over Dean’s hand, still holding onto the stereo. His laughter started to abate, the crashing waves fading into giggling seafoam. 

“That would be Sam’s. You know Sammy, right?” Dean waited for recognition to flash across Castiel’s eyes, and once it did he smiled. “Good.” 

Castiel glanced at the clock in the dashboard, and then at his hand, still resting on Dean’s. “We should go,” he said, “it’s getting late.” 

Dean blinked hard, swallowed, and turned his hand over. His fingertips brushed Castiel’s, a featherlight touch that made them both draw in a sharp breath. “Okay, Cas.” He didn’t move his hand away. 

They swung out of the parking lot as the ice between them began to thaw. Castiel started to hum something softly, tapping his fingers against Dean’s palm. “You think about what I said at all?” 

It was completely out of the blue, a wild shot from the boy, and it took Dean a few seconds to remember what he was referring to. _Gay. Me. Realizing things._ He turned onto the long stretch of road that would bring them closer to school, evergreen trees blurry out the window as he topped 45 miles an hour. His mind slipped, meandering from the road in front of him to the boy beside him, who was still playing the piano on Dean’s hand. He was quite pretty, Dean thought, the sort of pretty that warrants staring for hours throughout the day to see what the changing light does to their face. He had seen the pre-dawn blue-grey glint off of his eyes that morning, he remembered, the color bringing the cornflowers in his irises into bloom. It cast silver streaks through his hair, and turned his deep pink lips to rose petals. 

Yeah, it was definitely not a straight move to think about how gorgeous your new friend is, especially when every waking thought is haunted by his lips and poetry and the way the parental smile sat upon said lips when he looked at the rabbit bundled in Dean’s coat between them. 

“A bit,” he murmured noncommittally. Castiel’s hand froze against his. 

Dean scrambled for a new topic. “You ready for Saturday?” he blurted. 

“I think so,” Castiel replied, his voice dropping a bit in what sounded like disappointment. “Wish I had my soulmate bracelet on, though, kinda miss it. It’s in my bag, though.” 

“Oh, is that what that was? I thought maybe your phone was overheating, or somethin’, it was nearly smoking.” 

Castiel blanched. “Hmm, yeah. It’s been doing that lately. You’re getting yours back today, right?” 

“Yeah.” 

The conversation lapsed into silence again, but softer, gentler silence. Their hands were still together. Dean took a turn sharply, and Castiel’s hand latched onto his through the bulky cast. The school’s tall brick buildings appeared at the end of the road, and reality snapped back into place for both of them. It was cold, reality, the reminder that they had to find soulmates and had to do well in school and had to… and had to… there wasn’t much else, really, but the tension in the air grew and grew. 

“Dean.” 

“Yeah, Cas?” 

“Thank you for this,” he whispered, nodding to their hands. 

“No problem, buddy,” Dean said, and he almost meant it. 

But really? There was a problem. There was a problem because he’s not as dense as he tries to come off, and the only person near Castiel’s soulmate bracelet when he last saw it was… him. And it nearly left a welt on his hand when he grabbed it. There were exactly three possibilities in his mind, three roads branching away from driving down the school’s access road, hand in hand with a blue-eyed angel whose sweet nature and poetic words and open heart deserved better than him. 

Possibility one: Dean was entirely mistaken, and the bracelet was reacting to someone in the hallway or another room or otherwise close by. This possibility twinged his heart, the same possessive twinge that snapped across his chest when he saw someone else with his brother. It meant he was losing something. 

Possibility two: The bracelet had been left in the sun, or microwaved, or someone dropped it in a pot of boiling tea. It wasn’t hot because of a person, but a mistake. Dean fairly quickly shook this one off, because really, who would microwave a bracelet? 

Possibility three sent sparks through his lungs. The possibility that it was _him_ the bracelet burned for, the same way Dean was pretty sure his did for Castiel. He had been thinking about it when Charlie acted like they were together over the phone. His wrist hadn’t exactly been cool onstage with Castiel, or in English class when he read the poem. 

He sent a prayer to whatever gods were listening for possibility three to be the one, and that Castiel felt the same way. 

He sent a prayer to the gay gods, that he would survive the next forty-five seconds and not crash the car from nerves. 

“Can I just read a poem I find for the poetry coffeehouse?” he squeaked, words tumbling out on top of each other in a big, disorganized heap. 

And then he shut his eyes for all of three seconds, until he remembered he was driving. 

“Dean,” Castiel started, eyes flickering with concern and… was that hope? 

No way. 

“You’re really presenting?” he asked, watching as Dean pulled into the school’s parking lot. Lucifer made a soft snuffling noise, and Castiel reached down to scratch him behind the ears. 

“Yeah, man, of course,” he grumbled, freckles standing out in sharp relief under his intense blush. 

“What poem?” 

It was such a simple question. 

Such a simple, easy question that had Dean put any thought into what he was saying more than a moment before saying it would have been answered instantly. 

But instead, he was here, pulling into his assigned parking spot, and the boy behind him was biting at his lip in expectation. So Dean answered with the only poem he remembered reading, ever, that had really stuck. 

“‘A Glimpse,’ by Walt Whitman,” he said, and the confidence in his voice startled him. 

His memory took over as he fell back through time, watching from above as thirteen-year-old Dean read this poem, just one sentence long, and realized that it was about two boys. In love. 

“The _love_ poem?” Castiel gasped, incredulity dripping off of his voice. 

“The love poem.” 

“Why?” 

Another simple question that threw daggers into his heart, turning to stare into blue eyes that just wanted to know an answer. Another simple question that he doubted his voice could handle answering. _For you,_ he considered, but the cowardly lion in his heart balked and growled at the idea. 

“For love,” he settled on, and squeezed Castiel’s hand just a little bit tighter. 

His heart decided that was close enough to a confession as he turned the car off and went around to help Castiel get his things. Lucifer scrabbled at his hand until he tucked him back into the pocket of his leather jacket. His fingers brushed a slip of paper as he settled the rabbit’s hind legs in, and he pulled it out slowly. _Thank you for staying with me,_ it read. 

Well, if possibility three wasn’t reality, then he was Paris Hilton.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My deepest apologies for how long it took me to update this. Next chapter up tomorrow, I swear. Please leave kudos and comments if you liked what you read! 
> 
> The poem "A Glimpse" will be included in the text of the story in the future, so don't worry about not knowing it! I had to go research some of Whitman's work to find it, because I knew it existed but not where. But, if you want to know in advance exactly what's going to happen, then... go nuts. 
> 
> Thank you!


	9. Unification and Reunification

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Both boys get their soulmate bracelets back.

_Friday morning, 7:53 AM_

“Castiel! You’re back!”

A wall of red flannel and even redder hair smacked into him, knocking him off-balance as his cast got squashed against his stomach. He coughed as the air was forced from his lungs and pulled back, spluttering. 

“Hello, Charlie, I’m indeed back.” He grinned at her as she ran a hand through fireball hair and appraised him. 

“You look like hell, and where’s your soulmate bracelet? Shouldn’t you have it back on by now? Or was Dean—”

“Bracelet’s in my bag, can you help me get it back on? The damn thing nearly burned through the pocket.”

He swung the bag off of his shoulder and pawed through it for his notebook and the bracelet, both of which had ended up covered in crumbs from his hospital bed snacking. The notebook fell into the same position as always, tucked under his arm, and he passed the slowly cooling bracelet to Charlie with a gentle hand. 

“I have news,” he continued, as she reached for his hand to fasten the black leather bracelet around it once again. “Good news,” he specified, and her expression of abject horror morphed into hunger. 

“ _Dean_ news?” she asked, and the mischievous glint in her eye told him she already knew the answer was yes. She snapped the iron clasp shut, pulling it tight around his arm, and patted it twice. 

“This sounds like a bad rom-com, and I know it does,” he began, and she cut him off, squealing. 

“He kissed you! No! He asked you out! No, you’re getting married?” she tried. He laughed and shook his head, but her words sparked the ribbon of hope in him again. No one said that those weren’t possibilities, at least, but something in him cracked at the disbelief in her voice. She’d felt his bracelet around him, remarked on its scorching silver studs, and yet the incredulity in her voice was all too real to him. Dean was totally out of his league, and everyone knew it. 

“Cassie?” 

“He didn’t kiss me, but we sort of held hands in the car here,” he said, softly, the words rumbling in his chest. The memory of Dean’s fingers against his was still fresh and clear in his mind, the calluses on the fingertips rough against his own smooth hands. “And he said he’s reading a love poem on Saturday.” 

Charlie, predictably, screamed. Several students in the hall turned to stare at her, the girl with the galaxy-print backpack who just broke all decibel readers within fifteen miles into several thousand pieces before the sun had cleared the trees. 

“He’s in love with you. Guaranteed. I swear,” Charlie said, with enough finality in her voice that Castiel started to believe it, too. 

“I certainly hope so. Heaven knows the feeling is mutual.” And really, Heaven ought to have known the feeling was mutual. He’d most definitely prayed enough, written enough in his notebook about the boy with the green eyes and blonde hair who looked like summer had taken on a corporeal form, scrawled out enough poems about his winter twining into Dean’s summer like an icy snake, stretching his scales across the warm, tan expanse of Dean. 

The warning bell rang, harsh and jarring, and Charlie turned to get to her first period class. 

“See ya, Cassie!” she called, sweeping between the sluggish river of students heading to their first-period classes in the silky manner of a salmon. 

***

First period for Castiel was English, and that meant more proximity to Dean. Good for his heart, bad for the clarity of his thoughts. The static was already starting as his wrist burned, his good arm faltering as he pushed open the door. 

The board read “Practice in Pairs for Tomorrow!” and Castiel seethed for all of two seconds before he noticed Dean staring. Cautiously, slowly, he made his way over to the boy’s customary chair by the window. Dean cocked an eyebrow at him as he approached, and tilted his backpack to reveal Lucifer, snuggled inside. 

“He’s comfy like this,” Dean offered as an explanation. “And I didn’t want to leave him alone all day. Also, hey,” he asked, expression darkening from quiet secret-keeping to confusion, “how long have you and Charlie been friends? 

_Oh._ “I texted her about your soulmate bracelet in the hospital, remember? We’ve always been friendly enough, but got to chatting a bit in the few days before that.” Dean looked satisfied with that explanation, so Castiel dropped it. Mentioning the bracelet reminded him to Dean’s wrist. The brown leather band languished there, and he smiled. “Glad to see you got that back.” 

Absentmindedly, Dean reached for it, running his fingers over the imprinted leather. “Yeah,” he muttered, and then: “You wanna practice for the poetry thing with me?” 

Castiel just nodded hard enough to knock his head off of his neck, gesturing to the teacher and mouthing ‘can we go?’, then grabbing Dean by the wrist. 

He immediately let go as his palm was nearly burned off. “Sorry,” he whispered, and checked to see if Dean had noticed. Fortunately, candy-apple eyes were fixed on his backpack, in which Lucifer was munching on his chemistry textbook. “You ready to go?” he asked, louder, and Dean stood up, chair screeching on the linoleum.

Side by side the boys made their way to the supply closet down the hall, one of the approved practice locations listed on the board. Castiel snuck glance after glance at Dean, specifically at the leather bracelet half-obscured by his jacket. Brown leather on brown leather was certainly a _look_. The boy transferred his books to the other arm and swung open the door. 

 

“Since I’m the reason you still only have one working arm, after you, gorgeous,” Dean said, and made a show of bowing him in, face twisted in a caricature of a gentleman. “May I take your coat?” 

Castiel was reeling once again. Not only was he now in a confined, airless space with Dean, but he’d just been called gorgeous by the human incarnation of Aphrodite, had the goddess of beauty presented masculine and been a bowlegged teenage boy rather than a long, lean woman. And he’d felt the boy’s soulmate bracelet, which felt almost exactly as hot as his own. 

In his mind, that was all the confirmation necessary to convince him that he and Dean were soulmates. 

Dean’s mind appeared to be somewhere else entirely, as he turned to Castiel and blurted, “I’m bi.” 

Several breathless seconds passed. 

Already stagnant air froze entirely, holding itself motionless for the two boys to face off. 

And then they both spoke. 

“Sorry, that was—” “Thank you for—” “I just wanted—” “Good to know—”

The silence blossomed again. 

Green eyes cautiously met blue. 

Blue eyes gazed back, confident and still. 

“You said to think about what you said, and realize some shit, and I _did_ , and so I told you, and I just wanted you to know, ‘cause the poem I picked is pretty gay, not gay like the ‘haha that’s so gay’ way but the boys-loving-boys way, like I do, ‘cause you’re gay, too, and I figured…” 

“Dean.” 

There was something to be said for the way neither of them expected what came next, least of all Castiel, who initiated it. 

Hugging Dean was exactly like he’d thought of, written about, in his moleskine journal. Dean was warmth, and sun, and the sweet smell of leather seats in an old family car. He was the rays of sunshine on a field of grass near Castiel’s house, the place where he went to think and write and read and sometimes, lay back and daydream. His shoulders were the way he’d thought, too, moving under his leather jacket, strong and muscular in the way that a hard day’s work forces them to be, rather than hours spent in a gym. Holding the boy in his arms was protective, the hard shell of Castiel’s own icy, foreboding, shut-out winter keeping his summer in. 

“It’s okay. You’re okay. Let’s not practice, okay?” he whispered into Dean’s ear, and the chills that it sent down the taller boy’s body were a sense memory Castiel planned to keep as long as he lived. 

When they broke apart, Dean’s brow was no longer knitted in worry. Castiel had only one thing on his mind, though: _Dean’s soulmate bracelet had been on fire that whole time._ It was pressed against Castiel’s ribs, and he felt the metal studs burning against him through his grey shirt. 

*** 

 

When they broke apart, Dean had only one thing on his mind: _Cas’s soulmate bracelet had been burning into his back the whole time._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I told you I'd get this up today! Woo, consistency! Thanks to @just_here_to_read_stuff from the bottom of my heart for the support and general awesomeness. 
> 
> Leave comments and/or kudos if you enjoyed! I appreciate them SO much.


	10. Behind Blue Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Saturday's less than twelve hours away, and are our boys going to get brave enough quickly?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for a) how long this took to upload and b) how short it is. But there's more coming, I promise. Tomorrow's the big day.

_Friday afternoon, 3:18 PM_

Dean fell face-first onto his bed the second he got home. In reality it was a minute or so after walking through the front door, commanding Sam “don’t bother me,” and bolting his door shut, but it _felt_ like only a second. His day had been hectic, to say the bare minimum, and he had some thinking to do. So he assumed his traditional thinking position: lying upside-down in bed with a pillow over his face. 

He definitely liked Castiel. 

It was the blue eyes, he was sure of it, because he’d always been a sucker for blue eyes. And the brown hair, too, it was windswept and chaotic and so, so different from the boy underneath it. He’d always liked hair. 

The universe clearly thought he liked Castiel, if the tender burn mark on his wrist was any indication. The universe also clearly thought he was entirely incompetent, and really, he was, if he’d taken coming out to the gorgeous boy that lightly. His phone rang, some classic rock anthem blasting for all of two seconds before he managed to answer. 

“Yeah, Dean here, what do you want?” 

“Dean, we need to talk.” 

It was Balthazar, and from the tone of his voice he was amused. 

“Yeah, Bal?” he sighed. Today had been far too long for his friend to come and mess with him more when his heart and mind were drained and focused on someone else. “I’m kinda busy,” he added, as he pulled a blanket over his legs, “so can you make it quick?” 

“Oh, I don’t think you’ll want this to be quick, darling.” 

Well, _that_ got Dean’s attention, and he sat up slowly. 

“Want what to be quick?” Suspicion weighed his voice down, but it was Balthazar, so what could he possibly do that caused any serious repercussions? 

“I’ve been reliably informed that that Novak guy has some sort of _feelings_ for you,” he said, voice dripping with his ‘I know something you don’t’ voice. 

_Go fuckin’ figure_ , thought Dean, _but hey, maybe Bal will listen to you about this._

Rather than try to address what his friend had said and break the silence hanging static over the phone lines gently, he snorted hard into the receiver. 

“Think I’ve figured that one out by now, dude, no offense,” he chuckled. 

The sharp intake of breath on the other end told him all he needed to know: Balthazar was ready to hear the details. 

“Tell. Me. Everything.”

Dean thought for a moment about his friend, who had never had a soulmate bracelet because he simply said he didn’t want one, and how he’d always lived through Dean’s love of the world. 

 

He was cold and broken, a fallen soul who needed someone to love for him. 

_Well,_ Dean realized, _I’m the one to love for him_. 

And love, he would.

“He’s everything, Bal, he’s got these blue eyes and he’s just a tiny bit shorter than me and you were there when I hit him with my car, right, and,” Dean gasped a breath and kept right on talking, “he was so brave in the hospital and _oh my god you know he’s gay right_ like I told you that or someone did?” It wasn’t a genuine question, nor could it ever have been, because any time for response was crushed and washed away in the waterfall of his words. He heaved a deep breath and was set to keep talking before Balthazar cut him off. 

“Is he your soulmate, though?” 

Dean’s stomach burned for a moment before he remembered a very different feeling. Castiel’s bracelet against his skin, and whispered the only word that felt right: “Yes.”

God, he couldn’t wait for Saturday. 

***

_Friday afternoon, 3:06 PM_

Castiel’s mind was whirling, and he couldn’t pull it together to save his own life. 

Every love poem he’d ever read, from Shakespearean sonnets to the jotted-down free verse he’d found in the back of one of his own notebooks, was a lie. 

If love was a robber, then he was ready to be stolen from. 

If love was the sun, then he was laying bare under its rays, and it was warm on his skin. 

And if he’d known who he’d have as a soulmate, who he could have forever, when he’d written that poem in class, well, it’d have been a lot different. 

His desk sagged under the weight of books and stacks of paper and a few months’ worth of empty coffee mugs. He shoved it all aside and started to write his own poem, thoughts of Dean thrumming under his skin and through his blood. A hug. A grin. His bracelet, white-hot to the touch. Caramel-apple green eyes. He'd quickly switched from pen to pencil when he realized the pen fit awkwardly against his cast and smudged across the page, and besides, lead was far more comforting than blue ink.

The words fell from his pencil slowly, cautiously, stumbling down the lead. A text from Charlie shook his phone, screen glowing from where he’d tossed it on his bed, and he slid across the room in his desk chair. 

>>operation Romeo, Romeo is a go. 

He groaned audibly, the sound painful and loud in his empty room. She’d sent a text to Dean’s friend, that British man Balthazar, saying something vague about ‘Castiel’s hung around Dean a lot, huh?’, and he’d expressly told her not to. 

He didn’t need any more confusion between the two of them, not after the closet. After the revelation. 

He didn't need Dean to know about the excitement he'd hid, about the barely-contained joy that had nearly crackled out of his body. About the prayer and hope he'd hidden behind blue eyes, pulling him into a hug instead. 

_That was... poetic,_ he thought, grinning. Maybe a love poem was easier when you were genuinely in love, when you had found someone for your forever. 

Sliding back over to his desk, scooping up his pencil, trying to coax the wily ravens of his thoughts back into a manner suitable for composing a poem, only one thing remained on his mind: God, he couldn’t wait for Saturday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, my apologies for length, but if you've followed the story this far since the beginning say hi in the comments! I'd love to hear what you think of it. And as always, please leave kudos if you enjoyed what you read! 
> 
> Thank you so much! :)


	11. Coffeehouse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Saturday.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We made it, boys. Here we go. Also this chapter is long as heck but it was NECESSARY and that's okay!! Poem is original work, and references certain fics that I've either really loved or have meant something to me. The whole poem is italicized to make reading it easier.

Saturday morning dawned clear and cold and everything else that makes staying inside all the more cozy, and Castiel was awake for every second of it. Half the night had gone into writing the poem, into getting words on paper and cursing his hand for aching inside the cast when he took breaks. The other half had gone into slashing it apart with his pencil, into crossing out digressions about Dean’s eyes and extended metaphors about poppy fields. _But they’re fitting,_ he’d argued. _But it’s forced,_ he’d argued back. 

The sun rose, sloshing warm molten caramel across the horizon, and he’d thought of Dean. 

That had been forced, too, he realized, but it was Saturday, and he’d been perfecting this poem all night. He shuffled the papers back in order, standing in front of the mirror, and started reciting from the beginning. 

His soulmate bracelet flashed with heat when Dean crossed his mind. 

***

Dean grumbled awake sometime around noon, squinting in annoyance at the sun slanting through his windows. Icicles of fear jolted down his back when he remembered the day: Saturday. Poem day. _Cas_ day. 

He’d fallen asleep with the poem on his pillow, creases worn deep into the paper from frantic folding and unfolding. But it was memorized, at least, and that was all he’d been told to expect. 

Five p.m. seemed ages away, the seconds on the clock dragging by, and he pulled on his running shoes to pass the time. Nothing like a two-mile jog to clear his head, even as he glanced out the window and smiled, sky the same shade of piercing blue as Castiel’s eyes. 

*** 

_Saturday, 4:28 PM_

Castiel was giddy, cheeks flushed warm and fingers dancing trippingly across his leg. The students were milling about in the temporary green room, really just a spare classroom at the back of the theater. It was amazing how many people showed up to perform, the room rattling with laughter and snippets of conversation; half the football team huddled together in the corner, jerseys draped loose over unpadded shoulders, the senior running back smearing eye-black on their cheeks. A stoner slouched against the door frame, muttering to herself and running shaking fingers through greasy hair. 

All in all, order in chaos, pockets of students living in their own worlds. 

And one Dean Winchester, chewing on his lower lip and running his hands across a crumpled notecard. Alone in the crowd, and looking altogether too small, too fragile in his worn leather jacket. As Castiel watched, he grabbed for his wrist, a jolt of shock flashing across his face, then looked around. Green eyes scanned the mass of impatient teenagers, and Castiel waited for them to land on him. When they finally flickered his way, he grinned, warmth spreading from his bracelet and chest. The din in the room faded out as he squeezed through the groups. 

“Dean.” It was more of a statement than a greeting, but the boy nodded and returned his smile eagerly. 

“Hiya, Cas, you ready?” His voice shook, and something cold and hard flashed in his eyes for a split second. 

The boy was a wreck, and it was obvious, and all Castiel really wanted was for him to not feel scared anymore. The only natural move, then, was to soothe. Hands on the lapels of his leather jacket, and _pull_. Their chests smacked together as Castiel wrapped his arms around him. 

The noise of the room was inconsequential, but Dean’s heart pounding against his own was not. 

“Is this okay?” 

It mattered, one hand pressed against Dean’s shoulder and the other at the base of his spine, and his breath caught in his throat as he waited for a response. 

Dean moved the tiniest amount, an inclination of the head, but it was enough. Something between them changed, then, a transfer of electricity and trust. They were together, now, two hearts against the world, but two minds still in denial of their bond. 

Maybe soulmates weren’t always obvious, but they had come a long way since the first day, the stolen poem. Since the declaration of ‘Saturday.’ 

Dean’s nerves were still frayed, his hands clutching far too tightly to Castiel’s shirt. 

“I’ll watch out for you,” Castiel whispered into his ear, smoothing one hand down his back. They stayed there, arms around one another, for long enough that the football team noticed. Someone wolf-whistled, another called “get it, Winchester!” and they broke apart. 

Dean’s freckles stood out bright against pink cheeks. “Sorry, and thanks,” he mumbled, turning away. “It’s almost time, isn’t it?” 

He was still starstruck by the warm, sharp scent of Dean, and the three seconds it took for him to snap back in were probably too long to be socially acceptable. Even more so when he’d been staring intently at his mouth the whole time. 

“Er, um,” he began, scanning the room for a clock, “yeah.” There was one, reading one minute til showtime. 

“You’re on first, right?” It was a rhetorical question, and Dean kept right on talking, “I’m totally going to go out there and watch you, I mean, that’s the whole reason I’m here, right, for you—” he paused, thinking. “For your poetry, that is,” he backtracked. “You challenged me to this, after all,” he said, “and besides, my soulmate’s going to be here anyways, so it’s a two-birds-with-one-stone typa deal.”

Castiel didn’t miss his slip of the tongue, nor did he miss the nervous hand that instinctively went to grab his bracelet. _Cute_ , he thought, _I wonder if he knows that I’m—_

“Castiel Novak, please come out onto the stage to begin,” the vice principal crackled over the P.A. 

He swallowed, running two fingers across the blunt edge of his cast. There were certainly a lot of people out there, he realized, and deep in his chest, panic began to set in. 

“C’mon,” came a voice, deep and gentle, “I’ll take you out there.” 

His eyes belied none of his fear of the presentation, but a different, warmly frightened apprehension. A warm hand knocked against his, and his fingers laced with Castiel’s. “You can do this, Cas.” Green eyes searched for consent from blue, and Castiel simply squeezed his hand and cocked one eyebrow. 

Castiel wasn’t expecting to feel Dean’s soulmate bracelet brush his good wrist, wasn’t ready for the searing heat of it, and gasped. The isolation of his other arm, still encased in plaster, only enhanced the burn, and it shocked his system. Dean _had_ to feel that too, right? He sought acknowledgement in Dean’s eyes, but they remained resolute as he tugged him towards the door. 

“Dean, there’s something you should—”

Dean split away at the door, tossing him a careless wink. “Good luck, Cas,” he said, “I’ll be watching.” 

***

Dean’s mind was a blur, thoughts flying haywire through his consciousness. All memory of his poem was gone, and the words on the notecard before his eyes swam wildly. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t present the gayest poem ever written in front of literal hundreds of people. Tears started to well at the corners of his eyes, hot and dangerously close to spilling over. Everyone else was talking and laughing in groups, he noticed, scanning the room for familiar faces. His eyes skimmed over dark brown hair, staring vaguely near him, and then caught the shine of piercing blue eyes. Castiel smiled widely at him, and a burst of joy flashed into his chest as the boy made his way through the clusters of students. 

Their conversation was a blur, and Dean’s heart was making a valiant attempt to crack through his chest. 

Castiel frowned at him for a split second, and then his arms were around him and Dean felt his fears fall out through his feet. At least Castiel, the blue-eyed angel that he was, wouldn’t judge him for his recitation. His shell-shock made him miss the words whispered in his ear, but as Castiel began to pull away he frantically nodded, and then the room, previously oblivious to their moment, took notice. 

“Get it, Winchester!” 

It dawned on him that it was nearly time to start, and once again his blood started to thrum with nervousness. Castiel was on first. His brain threw itself from his skull again, and somehow, the worried lines creasing Castiel’s forehead as soon as their vice principal’s nasally voice rattled across the P.A. drove him to reach for his hand. 

When the boy squeezed back, grateful ease relaxing his shoulders as they wound through the room, Dean felt his soulmate bracelet brush against Castiel’s arm. He flinched, and Dean could feel his eyes on him. _Don’t acknowledge it,_ he thought, _maybe he didn’t notice._

He tried to cement the feeling of their hands together in his mind, tried to take in the texture and warmth of his palms, the slight calluses on his fingertips. 

“Dean, there’s something you should—”

He didn’t want to hear it, didn’t want to hear that there was something wrong. He wanted to hear poetry, wanted Castiel to say his part, and really, he wanted _him_. 

True love strikes quick, but God, does it strike hard. 

_Soulmates, huh._

Then they were at the door, and Castiel was clenching and unclenching his jaw again. Their hands separated, and with a word of encouragement, he sent Castiel to the stage and made his own way to the wings. 

“Let’s see what’cha got, Cas,” he said to no one in particular, watching as his frame was lit by the spotlight. 

***

Wow, that was a lot of people. 

The auditorium was packed, fragments of whispered conversations drifting through the still air, the glow of phone screens illuminating certain faces. Charlie was right up front, red hair wild, and she waved frantically at him as he stepped towards the lone microphone in center stage. 

“Um. Hi,” he began, and quickly stepped away as the receiver gave a shriek of feedback. “Hello,” he tried again, louder. “I’m Castiel Novak, a student here, and I’m going to be presenting a poem I wrote.” A flicker of motion caught his eye, a shadow sliding across the wall in the wings. 

Dean was there. 

He could see him, could see the way he leaned against the corner, and caught the nearly imperceptible motion of his hand, rubbing across his bracelet. 

Someone in the audience cleared their throat, and he continued. “It’s called ‘The things no one told me about love’ and it’s about my soulmate, who’s actually here tonight.” 

A murmur arose, but he jumped in, picturing the words on the page in his notebook. He accentuated pauses, the rhythm of his words lilting and smooth. 

_“No one gave any advice, really, just words like_  
_‘You’ll find them one day,’_  
_And_  
_‘Don’t give up hope,’_  
_And_  
_‘She’s out there, somewhere.’_  
_They’d always told me to believe in my soulmate.”_

He’d closed his eyes at some point, lost in his own words, lost in the images that flashed through his mind as he had written them. The stanza ended and he blinked them back open. A deep breath, and continue. 

_“To fall in love, start slow._  
_Start with a note, folded into a tiny square.”_ A soft intake of breath from the shadow in the wings.  
_“Start with a poem, snatched from your hands._  
_Start with defending their honor._  
_Start with karaoke._ A stifled laugh from the far corner of the room gave away Balthazar.  
_Start with a big, black car.”_

Dean had crept forward as he spoke, and the glow of light from the stage reflected onto his face. He was staring intently at Castiel, but he kept speaking. 

_“They never said that he’d go with me,”_ he continued.  
_“That before he knew what I knew,_  
_Before he felt it, too,_  
_That he’d take me to a hospital and patch up my broken outsides._  
_They never said anything about waking up to a boy asleep in a chair beside you,_  
_Never said anything about two lost bracelets.”_ He allowed himself one glance at Dean, whose eyes were close to burning a hole straight through him. Absentmindedly, he reached for his bracelet at the same time as Dean, their actions mirrored. 

_No one told me about the notes I’d tuck in his pocket and backpack and binders,_  
_About waiting for him to find them._  
_They never said a word about the bubbles in my chest,_  
_Crystalline and fragile and infinite,_  
_And they’d never told me that it would feel like electricity under my skin,_  
_The technology and rhythm of a thousand years burned into my body._  
_I was told to hold on, and a soulmate would find me._

_If they were right about love, if I’m doing it wrong, then no one’s told me how to do it right._

_They said nothing about green eyes,_  
_The bright green of spring shining year-round,_  
_The hue of leaves on trees and flecked with golden sun and stars._  
_They said nothing about his freckles,_  
_Constellations tracking across his skin,_  
_Stellar to the end and intoxicating like whiskey._

Charlie, enraptured in the front row, grinned widely. They made eye contact, and she held up a “D” with her fingers, cocking her head jauntily. He nodded. 

_They’d said nothing about the other side, either._  
_Nothing about the confusion,_  
_The confessions,_  
_The moments of heat and then pain._  
_They’d told me nothing about the poppy field of love,_  
_And that my soulmate stood amidst the blood-red petals._

_If falling from on high means I crash into love,_  
_Means I crash into you,_  
_Means I trip over you and your words,_  
_You and your big black car and our little black rabbit._ He could feel Dean grinning, could feel the warmth sparking off of him. He carried on, even as a smile of his own spread across his face.  
_Then I’d fall, I’d rebel, I’d do it all again for you._ His voice rose, gravel grating deep in his throat as emotion bubbled. A second away from his voice cracking, he thought.  
_And I will grasp you by the hand and raise you from this hell with me._

_No one predicted him,_ he said, the final stanza finally upon him, the words scratched down in his notebook still clear in his mind. Pages of descriptions of Dean, of his eyes and his soul, clear as day in his mind’s eye.  
_The boy in a thousand pieces._  
_The boy with a broken past and a cracking heart._  
_No one predicted the profound bond._  
_No one predicted the red thread of fate_  
_Wrapping itself between him and me,_  
_Tying leather bracelet to leather bracelet, and iron heart to iron heart. ___

____

____

The microphone was suddenly far too close, far too in his face, and he exhaled, taking a massive step back. Stunned silence preceded cacophonous applause, Charlie whistling and Balthazar shouting “Attaway, Cassie!” from the back. But the thunder was meaningless to him, the approval of hundreds paling as he turned to face the boy standing just out of the audience’s line of sight. 

With a quick, shallow bow, Castiel slipped off stage, making a beeline for Dean. 

His mouth hung open, jaw entirely slack. As Castiel got closer, stepping just past him out of the hot lights, he finally managed to speak. 

“You have really beautiful handwriting, soulmate.” 

Castiel could only smile and incline his head in acknowledgement. 

“Is there any way I can skip out on reading a poem, now?” he asked, hopeful notes trickling into his voice. “The only reason I came was to… well, was to meet you,” he admitted. "I should've guessed." 

A soft flash of pride and protectiveness ran through Castiel’s chest. Dean came for him. For _him._

“Of course, Dean. Let’s go.” 

Sneaking through the rear exit was ordinarily no easy feat, but their English teacher waved them through with a quiet “so beautiful, Mr. Novak,” and they made their way into the night together. 

The parking lot was on the far side of the empty, darkening campus, and it was cold out. Cautiously, Castiel reached for Dean’s fingertips. Smoothly, like a key sliding into a lock, their hands fit together, and a thrum of heat and energy passed through Castiel’s bracelet. 

“We should go somewhere,” Dean said, as they passed locked classrooms. “We’ve got—”

“A lot of talking to do, yes,” Castiel finished. “The lake?”

“The lake,” Dean agreed, and squeezed his hand once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay so ngl I cried a bit writing this cause apparently I'm really really attached to this story? Wow? So uh. Yeah. Leave comments and/or kudos if you liked it, and if you've been following this for a while let me know! I'm [@catstrophysics](https://catstrophysics.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr, come say hi:) Leave song recommendations! Yeehaw! Aftermath chapter will be posted v soon, maybe tomorrow, depending. Idk. 
> 
> Basically what happened was I took a three hour nap instead of doing AP Calc homework, and now I'm too awake to sleep so I'm finishing up as much of this as I can because it deserves an ending.
> 
> Poem in its entirety is [here](https://catstrophysics.tumblr.com/private/187343965672/tumblr_Ks2i3crgyU34EgoYm) on my Tumblr if you're interested, but I'm afraid it's private so you have to go through that link!


	12. Autumn Closing In

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Strange how the night moves, with autumn closing in._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is dedicated to @im-so-glad-i-failed / @just-here-to-read-stuff, who has stood by me throughout the altogether too long process of writing this. See the end for me being sad this story is finally closing.

The passenger seat of Dean’s big, black car enveloped him, worn leather wrapping him up until he thought he’d never be able to move again. 

The lake, as always, was silent and deserted. Pine trees whispered sweet nothings to the water, dry branch on dry branch, and Dean’s car’s engine, thrumming and heavy, was the loudest sound in the area. Blue-grey sky twinkled around the edges, stars peeking out. Calm for the first time in what seemed forever. 

The engine gurgled off, and Dean sighed heavily. His hand was still intertwined in Castiel’s, the boy’s fingertips rough against his palm as he drummed against his wrist. His bracelet still scorched, metal rivets points of white-hot silver, bright and insistent as the stars overhead. 

“You wanna get out?” he asked, shifting his weight back in the seat and casting a prayerful, worshipful glance over towards Castiel. Green eyes wide, sparkly, and pleading, and for the first time, Castiel noticed the gold in them, ringing the outside of the iris. The lights in the roof of the car, yellowed with age but still bright enough to see by, highlighted his freckles. A million constellations never before seen. 

He was beautiful, to Castiel, who could only whisper, “sure,” and watch as Dean delicately unfolded their hands and cracked his door open. The cool night air swept into the front seat as Dean made his way around the car to open Castiel’s door. Bowing gentlemanly, he swung the door wide. 

“Dean, what’re you—”

“Shh,” Dean cut in, “chivalry ain’t dead, right?” His voice was low, tinged with salted-caramel seriousness, but he was smiling. 

“You’re a…” Castiel began, pausing, “you’re a nerd,” he finished, landing on the word. “You’re such a nerd.” 

And suddenly his personality clicked into place; he had built himself of contradictions. Constructed of sharp edges and soft sides, an athlete and a top student. Old car, new shoes. Anachronistic. 

“Nerd, and proud of it,” he jabbed back, “and also incredibly, incredibly gay.” He drew in a sharp breath, withdrawing into himself as Castiel watched. Something had hit close to home. “Well, gay enough,” he added. 

Castiel stepped out of the car, swinging long legs over the low threshold. He stood, facing Dean, who stared intently at the mulch between his shoes. Dean didn’t meet his eyes, didn’t acknowledge that he’d moved. 

“Dean,” he said, “do you have a problem with this? With me?” Deep in Castiel’s chest, something cold and sharp twisted, ice shooting through his veins as he absently reached for his soulmate bracelet, noticing Dean do the same. How odd, he thought, that they had each evolved the same motion, each grown to consider their identifier something of _theirs_ , not something forced upon them. 

The answer was long in coming, too long, and the worst loomed in his mind. 

Dean didn’t say anything, stared out pensievely over the lake, gestured vaguely to the hood of his car. He sat down over the left headlight and patted the empty space next to him. Castiel joined, reaching tentative fingers for his hand again. He obliged, slipping their hands together, brushing his fingertips against Castiel’s bracelet. It was still burning, but no longer searing, a safe, protective warmth. 

He looked lost in thought, still gazing at the water, and asked Castiel, “Do you know the story behind these soulmate bracelets? How they work?” 

Castiel remained silent, in thought. _It doesn’t matter how they work,_ he’d always thought, _as long as they work._

Dean started in on the story. “No one really remembers who made the technology first, it was so long ago, but rumor holds that it was a love-struck physics professor, who understood particle entanglement enough to link two things together so they affected each other.” 

Castiel gave a snort of disbelief, about to cut in because this was ridiculous, but Dean squeezed his hand and he fell silent again. 

“Don’t question it, Cas. Anyways, supposedly once you find your soulmate, your bracelets should change somehow, to show that you have, you’ve, like,” he paused, searching for the word.

“Found each other?” tried Castiel, nerves tweaking his voice up an octave. Dean drew in a sharp breath. 

Neither of them said anything more, and the silence settled lightly between them. The breeze carried the dry, heady scent of dying pine needles around them, sweeping down over the lake water. Castiel let out a heavy, tired breath, making as if to speak again, but his wrist was freezing, colder than he ever remembered, as though his bracelet had turned to dry ice. Dean gasped and yanked his hand from Castiel’s, clutching at his bracelet. 

“What the hell?” he asked, unwrapping cautious fingers from around the bracelet. In the center, right between two matching embossed swirls, lay a sparkling blue stone, two silver wings stretching from each side, carved deep into the leather. Castiel’s own bracelet had settled back to normal temperature, and he chanced a look at it. In the same place as Dean’s, nestled between two silver studs, sat a deep green gem, cut into a pentagon, and surrounded with tiny flecks of a gold stone he didn’t recognize. 

Slowly, the realization dawned between them, slipping into their eyes, between their fingers, and they stared. Green eyes met blue, and for the first time, Castiel felt as though he wasn’t simply seen, wasn’t simply acknowledged, but that he was understood, and Dean smiled knowingly. 

Castiel saw Dean’s hand reaching for his wrist before he felt it, and when warmth surrounded it he was ready. He slipped his own arm around Dean’s back, leaning into his side, leather jacket rustling as they rearranged next to each other. 

Dean smelled like safety, Castiel realized, like warmth and protection. And he was humming softly. With a jolt, he recognized the melody. 

“San Antone,” he whispered, and Dean nodded. Suddenly, they were both giggling, grabbing onto one another. Dean’s laugh rang out across the water in peals like bells, and then they were stumbling down towards the water together. Castiel’s shoes caught on rocks and scuffed pebbles down the path worn by countless feet towards the gently lapping water. 

The pier stretched into the water, a few yards past the reeds along the shoreline, and the unspoken agreement between them led them to the end. The planks were old, half-rotted away in some places, but still holding firm enough to sit and walk on. They pulled off shoes and socks with some difficulty, fingers still laced, and several struggling seconds later, managed to sit down at the edge. 

Their hands were sweaty together in the autumn chill, but something dug into Castiel’s side, keeping the comfort from settling across him. With his free hand, he reached into the pocket, bending his elbow at a ridiculous angle to circumvent the cast still entombing his hand. It was his notebook. 

Where it all started: Tuesday. 

A note, tucked into a binder, simple as could be. 

“Hey, Dean, I’ve got something for you,” he said, rifling through the pages of the book. “Don’t read it until I walk away, though, okay?” 

He squeezed his hand gently, pushing up off the dock, and placed a folded sheet of paper next to him. 

“Just wave when you’ve read it, okay?” 

He left, walking back up the slope to the car. 

***

Dean clenched the slip of paper in his hand, and his nerves hummed through his entire body. 

Castiel’s silhouette leaned against the car in the distance, black shadow against black metal, stiff with apprehension. 

He dug around in his jacket pocket for his phone, flipped on the flashlight, and unfolded the paper. 

Slanting, familiar handwriting, a memory of notes past, skipped across the page. It was Castiel’s writing, and Dean couldn’t believe he’d never recognized it before, never noticed the delicate, artful words and the care with which they were written. 

English class came back to mind, the boy in the window, and the notebook on the desk. The poem in the notebook. 

A different poem, on the page before him. His poem. 

_A glimpse through an interstice caught,_  
_Of a crowd of workmen and drivers in a bar-room around the stove late of a winter night, and I unremark’d seated in a corner,_  
_Of a youth who loves me and whom I love, silently approaching and seating himself near, that he may hold me by the hand,_  
_A long while amid the noises of coming and going, of drinking and oath and smutty jest,_  
_There we two, content, happy in being together, speaking little, perhaps not a word._

And a tear hit the page. 

And another. 

And then Dean was crying, shoulders shaking, and he raised a hand and gestured for Castiel to come back. Waving, flailing, desperate, and he heard running footsteps crunch across the gravel pathway, transition to thudding across the boards of the dock, then a hand on his shoulder. 

“Dean,” his voice came, and warm arms enveloped him. “You’re safe. You’re okay.” 

“I just,” sobbed Dean, words choking in his throat, “I prayed for you, so damn much, Cas, and I prayed to gods I didn’t believe in anymore because I needed you, needed anyone, needed someone who would love me. And—” 

“And I do, Dean.” 

“And I just hoped you’d be someone good, someone warm, and you _are_ , and…” he trailed off, sniffling, grasping at Castiel’s sleeve. “Soulmates, huh.” 

Incredulity slipped back into his voice as the tears slowed, and he broke into a wide smile, beaming white teeth into the still, inky twilight. 

“Soulmates,” Castiel agreed. 

Then they were laughing, the sound echoing across the water. The night was cool, but the air between them crackled with heat, and when the sound died down they were once again staring into each other’s eyes. 

Blue eyes, Dean thought, looked even better in the dark. They positively twinkled, every star in the sky taking aim at them. 

It seemed the most natural thing in the world to lean closer, to put his hand on top of Castiel’s, still gripping his shoulder, to stare fixedly at deep blue eyes. 

A hairsbreadth separated them, and Castiel closed it, and Dean saw stars. Literally, in the moment before he closed his eyes, melting into the kiss, and figuratively, because this was his soulmate, and the heat intoxicated him. 

Poetry on paper flows like a river, flows in stanzas and lines, and Castiel 

Breaking apart took all his willpower, and a piece of his heart told him to keep going, to stay pressed against Castiel forever, but his lungs were aching and his fingers were cold. Tucking them into Castiel’s hand, pulling their clasped hands to his chest, running an icy thumb over the new green stone on his bracelet. 

“This feels forever,” he concluded, and tugged on Castiel’s arm to knock him over, laying his head in his lap. 

Castiel didn’t answer, just gazed up at him. 

Time passed, evident only in the deepening of the black in the sky and the settling-down of the birds and the growing numbness in his lower limbs, seconds ticking by too quickly still. Dean checked his watch after the equivalent of a few years passed. 

“Make a wish,” he mumbled, “eleven-eleven.” 

“Mmm,” agreed Castiel, and he nuzzled closer against Dean’s hip. “We should prob’ly,” he yawned, stretching as he did, “go home.” 

Dean stiffened, and Castiel, ever the angel, asked, “You wanna sleep over at my place, Dean? Parents won’ mind,” tapping lightly at Dean’s knee with his fingertips. The cast lay heavy on the dock, and Dean scooped it up onto his leg. 

“You sure?” 

“Of course.” 

***

Driving to his house with Dean proved harrowing, the boy going twice the speed limit at some points and steering with one hand, his other tight around Castiel’s own. 

“Turn right up ahead,” he relayed, and Dean swerved. “The yellow house on the left,” he said, and Dean screeched to a halt in the driveway. 

Next time they did anything, Castiel was driving. 

The house was silent, dark, and smelled vaguely of hay. Castiel had forgotten about that. The giant metal cage took up most of the floor in the kitchen, and a black ball of fur was snuffling around in it. 

“ _Lucifer!_ ” shouted Dean, dropping Castiel’s hand and running to the cage. 

“Shh,” cautioned Castiel, but the boy was already sprawled on the tile. 

“Oh, I missed you so much, little buddy, how are you? I love you so much, bunny, you’re so good…” 

He stopped gushing, but only because he’d lifted the rabbit from the pen and was tickling him between the ears. 

“You’re gonna be such a good boy, aren’t you, Luci? Yes you are!” 

_Never pegged him for a baby-talker,_ thought Castiel, slowly moving to kneel in the floor next to Dean. 

“He’s been doing remarkably well, actually. We can take him into my room, there’s a little cage in there.” 

Castiel stood again, gesturing for Dean to follow him. He kicked his shoes off in the hallway outside his room before pushing the half-open door fully open and flicking on the overhead lights. 

He’d forgotten the state his room was left in, grey comforter strewn sideways across the bed, heaps of books littering the floor. A pile of clean clothes dominated the desk, where he’d set them but hadn’t quite gotten around to putting them away. His poetry wall was a mess, too, sheets of paper tacked up haphazardly, post-it notes littering the floor below. 

Shame burned his cheeks, oddly reminiscent of another familiar burning sensation, and he glanced anxiously at Dean. 

“Sorry, it’s sort of a mess,” he began, moving to straighten the room out, or at least put the bed back in order, but Dean stopped him, shifting Lucifer to his right hand so he could wrap his left around Castiel’s waist. 

“It’s perfect,” Dean assured him, and pulled him in for a quick, chaste kiss to his forehead. “You’re perfect.” 

Insecurity washed over him, but the soft smile on Dean’s face shone it away. He was the sun, it was true, honey-colored and warm, absentmindedly rocking a little black rabbit in his arms. 

“Thanks, Dean,” he said, and motioned to the bed. “You wanna listen to music?” 

Dean flopped over backwards onto the bed, yelped, and sat back up. A pencil lay under his back, and he set Lucifer gently aside and threw the pencil towards Castiel’s desk. “Better,” he remarked, “and yeah, what do you like?” 

Castiel could only grin, pressing “Play” on the cassette player his mom had let him keep. An arpeggio kicked into gear, and a girl’s voice started to sing. 

Dean groaned, but the pink blush high on his cheeks was unmistakable. “Taylor Swift, eh?” 

Castiel giggled, breathy and uncharacteristic, then explained. 

“I made you a mixtape, you know, songs that remind me of you, as soon as I started to figure out we were probably soulmates. It’s… yeah.” He ducked his head awkwardly. “It’s sort of a gift,” he finished. 

The gold streaks in Dean’s eyes glistened. “For me?” he asked. 

“Yeah, for you.” 

And then he was tackled into the wall, Dean’s arms around him tight and a quiet, insistent _thank you_ whispered into his ear. 

Castiel pushed Dean off of him, wrapping both his arms around his back, and checked on Lucifer, who was nibbling unconcernedly at the blankets on the bed. 

They stayed up half the night, the clock passing one, then two.

Dean told Castiel the story of how he and Sam came to this school, the morning they first arrived. Charlie had been in the parking lot, he’d said, and had “threatened him with a foam sword.” Then, she’d actually attacked him with the sword, and Sam, just ten at the time, had used “the Force” to stop her, one hand extended. She’d collapsed, giggling, to the asphalt, and they’d gone out for dinner together that night. 

Castiel recalled the first time he saw Dean. Recalled “you didn’t have as many freckles back then,” to which Dean had responded, “sports.” 

They lay back on Castiel’s bed together, side by side, talking to each other and stealing glances and soft touches. The clock struck 2:15 and Castiel made to stand up, but Dean pulled him back down. 

“I’ve got something for you, too,” he said, unsure. “It’s in my jacket pocket, let me go get it.” 

His jacket lay in a heap next to Lucifer’s cage, where they’d transferred him when they moved to the bed. He rummaged around in the inside pocket, then pulled a little black notebook out. 

“I saw yours,” he explained, “and I wanted to do something similar. It’s not as good as yours, though,” he added defensively. 

“May I look?” asked Castiel, placing one hand softly over Dean’s own trembling one. “You don’t have to let me see, Dean.” 

He undid the band that held the cover on and handed the book to Castiel. He opened it gingerly, and read the inscription on the first page. 

_I hear the voices when I’m dreaming._

The second page was black and white, a sketch of clouds through a window. Two trees leaned against one another in the distance, and Castiel smiled. The branches were rendered in loving detail, and the signature in the corner of the page read a simple D.W. 

The next page was in partial color, and it was of the lake they’d been at earlier. In the drawing, it was day, and Castiel sorely wished he’d been there whenever Dean began this drawing. The leaves on the trees were lush, so unlike that night, and a flock of geese was immortalized in the watercolor sky. 

“Flip to the middle,” Dean suggested, and Castiel obliged. 

The very center page, stitches running down the gutter, was vibrantly colorful, and Castiel recognized the view instantly. It was their English class, from Dean’s seat, and Castiel in the drawing, wearing a deep blue sweater, gazed out the window, lost in thought. A bee hovered, wings translucent, in the crook of a wildflower. 

It was startlingly real, and shockingly emotional. 

“I drew this a few nights ago,” he said. “You can keep the journal, it’s for you.” 

Castiel rolled across the bed, hugging the book to his chest with his bad arm, and using his good one to lift Dean’s hand to his mouth. 

“Thank you,” he murmured against his knuckles, and kissed the back. 

By the time the clock struck three, both boys were asleep on the bed, side by side. 

Their two hands lay clasped together between them, one wearing a black bracelet with a deep green gem, studded with constellations, the other adorned with a brown leather band, blue stone in the center, black etchings tracing down the side.

In the cage on the desk, Lucifer nibbled on a piece of hay, black eyes glittering as he watched the rise and fall of the boys' chests.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Funny how the night moves, with autumn closing in._
> 
> I really hope you enjoyed this. It's the longest work I've ever written by far, and though it's far from perfect (that's what revision is for!), it's still something I'm proud of. The end of the show draws near, and I'm reminded why I started writing fic in the first place. Because there's another story to tell. So, to anyone who's read this since the first chapter came out, thank you, and to anyone else who picked it up once it was finished, thank you as well. I never expected this to get any hits, any comments, any kudos, because it's not a story anyone was eager to read. So it means a lot to me that anyone read it. 
> 
> Thank you for your time and your attention, and please, leave kudos/a comment if you enjoyed Leather Bracelets and Iron Hearts. (Or leave song recommendations.) Come say hi on tumblr, [@catstrophysics](https://catstrophysics.tumblr.com/). 
> 
> ~ -.-. .- - ... - .-. --- .--. .... -.-- ... .. -.-. ...

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading, and please leave kudos if this wasn't a waste of your time! A fun fact to leave with: According to superstring theory, in the fifth dimension the world barely differs from our own. In the sixth, one encounters every world that started the same way ours did (the Big Bang). In the seventh, the origins are different and the laws of physics are no longer consistent. In the eighth, it's no longer just versions of earth but instead any and all planets alike and unalike. In the ninth, you get every single universe that started at any point ever! And in the tenth, everything is possible so good luck.


End file.
